American Capitalist Society In The 19th Century

1834 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Impact of industrial revolution on society

Herman Melville’s Utilization of Bartleby the Scrivener: the Story of

Wall Street As a Means of Criticizing Capitalism and Its Crimes

Against Humanity

Herman Melville's "Bartleby, The Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street"

scrutinizes the alienation of labor, the social ideologies and the

dehumanizing consequences of the American capitalist society in the

19th

century. Bartleby is the main character in the story. The other

characters

in the story, Ginger Nut, Nippers and Turkey, barely survive their

pragmatic enslavement because they have been brainwashed by the

ideology of

complying and acknowledging their given place in society. Bartleby

separates himself from the other scriveners by daringly preferring not

to

surrender to the capitalistic authority. In 1856, Wall Street in New

York

City was solidly established. The 19th century brought an

"organizational

revolution"(Marx 102) to America which resulted in the creation of the

banking and credit establishments, brokerage houses and a prosperous

stock

exchange. A few years before Melville wrote Bartleby there were heated

conflicts between wage slaves and capitalists. Goods were beginning to

cost

less to produce

Lander Shafer 1 and craftsman could not produce goods so easily or

quickly.

Hostility and anger between craftsman and capitalists began to cause

street

riots. Visualize the drudgery of a repetitive task for hours a day.

Think

of losing all your inspiration and intelligent independence to the

degree

where your career becomes nothing more than a robotic reaction. We can

see

clearly how dissatisfying and hollowing a mundane task can be everyday.

So,

what can the unsatisfied worker do about their lowly position? First,

the

worker becom...

... middle of paper ...

...artleby, the Scrivener,' ESQ: A Journal of the American Renaissance

40

(fourth quarter, 1994): 278, 277. Marx, Karl. "The German Ideology."

The

Marx-Engels Reader. Ed. Robert C. Tucker. New York: W.W Norton and

Company,

1978. 146-200 Marx, Karl. "Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of

1844."

The Marx- Engels Reader. Ed. Robert C. Tucker. New York: W.W Norton and

Company, 1978. 66-132

Kuebrich, David, " Melville's Doctrine of Assumptions: The Hidden

Ideology

of Capitalist Production in 'Bartleby.' New England Quarterly Vol.69,

1996

Sept., 381-405

VAES, J., PALADINO, M. P., CASTELLI, L., LEYENS, J-Ph., & GIOVANAZZI,

A.

(2003). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, vol. 85, pp.

1016-

1034.

http://attitudes2disability.wordpress.com/2007/02/27/the-traditional-

model/. Retrieved 2009-10-12. "ableist model". wordpress. last modified

2007.

Show More
Related

  • The Capitalists Who Shaped Post-Civil War America

    972 Words  | 2 Pages

    Accurately established by many historians, the capitalists who shaped post-Civil War industrial America were regarded as corrupt “robber barons”. In a society in which there was a severe imbalance in the dynamics of the economy, these selfish individuals viewed this as an opportunity to advance in their financial status. Thus, they acquired fortunes for themselves while purposely overseeing the struggles of the people around them. Presented in Document A, “as liveried carriage appear; so do barefooted children”, proved to be a true description of life during the 19th century. In hopes of rebuilding America, the capitalists’ hunger for wealth only widened the gap between the rich and poor.

    Read More

  • Social Issues of Work in Ben Hamper's Book Riverhead

    1279 Words  | 3 Pages

    Rivethead is an account of the entire life of Author Ben Hamper, from his long family lineage of “shoprats” and his catholic school upbringing to his numerous different positions on the General Motors assembly line and his equally numerous lay-offs from the GM Truck & Bus Division. Unfortunately the many years of back breaking labor combined with Hampers own personal demons led him to check into an outpatient mental facility (at the time of the completion of this book) where he learns daily to cope with his many years of mental anguish. Rivethead is a social commentary on industrial America, assembly line work , and the auto industry. This essay, however, will focus on the more specific aspects Hamper considers, such as the monotony required on a (then) modern assembly line, the relationship and hierarchy among workers and their interaction with management as well as both collective and individual responses to work and job satisfaction (or lack there of).

    Read More

  • Conservatism: The Most Important Political Ideologies In The 19th Century

    914 Words  | 2 Pages

    During the 19th century, there were many important political ideologies all across the European continent. There was Conservatism, which favored the old or traditional political ideas. The extreme opposite of Conservatism was Liberalism. During this time period, Liberalism was considered any idea that went against the ideas of Conservatism. However, the ideas of Nationalism, possibly the most powerful political ideology of the time, did not fall under Conservatism or Liberalism. Nationalism was its own ideology that happened to be very compatible with Liberalism. Nationalism was the idea that nations should be comprised of people who share common roots and should be under one government; however, the Vienna Settlement directly opposed their ideas. The Austrians saw nationalism as a threat to them because they were comprised of many smaller nations while there were nationalist movements in

    Read More

  • Marx (The Communist Manifesto) and Rousseau

    2059 Words  | 5 Pages

    Marx, Karl, Friedrich Engels, and Robert C. Tucker. The Marx-Engels reader . 2d ed. New York: Norton, 1978. Print.

    Read More

  • Democracy In The 19th Century

    1358 Words  | 3 Pages

    Democracy in the United States became prominent in the early to mid 19th century. Andrew Jackson, the 7th president of the United States, was inaugurated in 1829 and was best known as the person who mainstreamed democracy in America. Because he came from a humble background, he was the “genuine common man.” (Foner, pg. 303) He claimed he recognized the needs of the people and spoke on behalf of the majority [farmers, laborers]. However, critics of Jackson and democracy called him “King Andrew I” because of his apparent abuse of presidential power [vetoing]. These critics believed he favored the majority so much that it violated the U.S. constitution, and they stated he was straying too far away from the plan originally set for the United States. Because of the extreme shift of power to the majority, the limiting of rights of the few [merchants, industrialists] and the abuse of power under Jackson’s democracy, the foundational documents set in the constitution was violated, and the work of the preceding presidents were all but lost.

    Read More

  • Essay On 19th Century American Culture

    567 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the 1800’s and first half of the 1900’s the WASP was seen as unjust and cruel by many European immigrants in America. Every single one of those terms however was necessary for full acceptance into the American mainstream: white, Anglo-Saxon (from northern Europe although the Irish are the exception) and Protestant. In the nineteenth century America was undergoing a dramatic transformation; the rise of industrialization, a massive influx of immigrants and urbanization caused racism to become a powerful force in American culture, affecting all parts of the political spectrum. American culture became obsessed with crude and cruel racial and ethnic stereotypes in literature, the arts and in the press.

    Read More

  • Rousseau and Marx: Property and Inequality

    1831 Words  | 4 Pages

    Marx, Karl, Friedrich Engels, and Robert C. Tucker. The Marx-Engels reader. 2nd ed. New York: Norton, 1978. Print.

    Read More

  • Marx, Weber, Durkheim, and Simmel: The Relationship between Society and the Individual

    3473 Words  | 7 Pages

    Bender, Frederic L. Karl Marx: The Communist Manifesto. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. ed. 1988.

    Read More

  • Marxist Lens Analysis of Kafka's Metamorphosis

    1307 Words  | 3 Pages

    Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. "The Communist Manifesto." The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Vincent B. Leitch. New York: Norton, 2001. 769-773.

    Read More

  • Capitalism In America

    1274 Words  | 3 Pages

    Often times, Americans do not realize the corruption that surrounds them in their nation. Capitalism is an economic and political system in which the country’s trade and industry is controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state. Business owners, CEO’s, corporations, and large businesses have the propensity of taking extreme advantage of the power capitalism brings. For decades companies and corporations have been taking unexplainable benefit of the power they have. Capitalism in the Unites States leads to corruption.

    Read More

  • Marxist Theory and Oedipus the King

    1332 Words  | 3 Pages

    Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. The Communist Manifesto. Trans. Paul M. Sweeny. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1998.

    Read More

  • Marxist Perspective on Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis

    1813 Words  | 4 Pages

    Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. "The Communist Manifesto." The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Vincent B. Leitch. New York: Norton, 2001. 769-773.

    Read More

  • Marxism and Leninism

    1618 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Web. The Web. 15 Apr. 2014. The 'Standard' of the 'Standard'. Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels.

    Read More

  • Analysis on Marx’s Historical Materialism

    1246 Words  | 3 Pages

    Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. "The German Ideology." The Marx-Engels Reader. Ed. Robert C. Tucker. New York: Norton, 1978. 146-200. Print

    Read More

  • Political Developments In The 19th Century

    1145 Words  | 3 Pages

    The era of the Civil War brought a multitude of changes that would impact the lives of all Americans. After the conclusion of what would be the bloodiest war of the 19th century, several constitutional and social developments were brought into effect. Such constitutional developments included the Emancipation Proclamation and the Radical Reconstruction of Andrew Johnson. To a similar extent, the passage of the 15th Amendment guaranteed all African American males the right to vote, regardless of any previous condition of servitude. However, in spite of many positive constitutional developments that arose during this era, a combination of legal developments such as Black Codes and Poll taxes, combined with negative social developments such as the Rise of the Ku Klux Klan and White Supremacy resulted in an unstable

    Read More

More about American Capitalist Society In The 19th Century

Open Document