Summary Of Spreading The American Dream By Emily Rosenberg

The first chapter of Spreading the American Dream by Emily Rosenberg focuses mainly on the American economic and cultural expansion of 1890 to 1945, with the help of liberal-developmentalism. Rosenberg opens up the chapter discussing the Columbian exposition in Chicago of 1893, and provides multiple examples of how it displayed America’s progressive advancements. The exhibitors of the exposition proudly displayed all the wonderful advancements the country had made so far, flaunting America’s faith. Some examples of the technological and scientific advancements included new types of machinery and transportation methods. Rosenberg also discusses the ideology of liberal-developmentalism and how it contributed to the progressive period in the United

States, by helping spread knowledge and truth. Rosenberg does a good job of giving an adequate amount of information to prove that in the 20th century United States, mass culture and technological advancements were ruling and changing the lives of American people, demonstrating how powerful they are.
Rosenberg provided many examples on the numerous scientific and technological developments that were discovered in 20th century America.

The reader can develop a vivid picture in their head about this specific expansion in America. She provided detailed examples of these advancements, which included transportation vehicles, engines of progress, and farm machines. These descriptions show how gifted the America people are and how they had the capability of inventing new types of machinery from creative ideas and thoughts. The author mentioned that these advancements led to human betterment and a stronger United States. In this era, the United States was competing with Europe and it is amazing to see how the United States managed to surpass Europe with all the creative ideas flowing around. The American people cherished this type of progress. The author’s tone shows how these progressive ideas and inventions were and still are prized. As an American, I was amazed by all the different types’ of machinery that were invented in the 20th century. In my opinion, the railroad seems like one of the most important inventions mentioned because it helped people get from place to place quickly. The invention of trains and

railroads to this day is still cherished and used for many purposes. Another example of a technology advancement is the multiple farm machines mentioned in this introductory chapter. Rosenberg argues that in the 20th century, it was a time in history where farmers were weaning off human labor and started to use different types of machinery to speed up the farming process. It was important for her to mention this because it proves how significant the farmer industry is and how these advancements improved the farming industry. These inventions helped Americans expand the farming industry because they were able to mass produce and ship to other countries, which brought in revenue for the United States. Other inventions such as shoe makers helped the average American person. This invention helped produce shoes at a faster pace and improved the quality of the shoe. I can deduce that the shoe machine lowered the cost of the shoe and made them widely available and more affordable for the American people. The 20th century truly revolutionized America. The author did an excellent job of providing the reader with many examples of the new inventions of the 20th century and how Americans benefited from these inventions.
The author did an excellent job arguing that the economic and cultural expansion of America came to be due to the ideology of liberal-developmentalism.

It seems that the reason America progressed was because of liberal-developmentalism, and I agree that this ideology played a major role in the progressive era. She mentioned that this ideology that can be broken into five rules where one of the rules allowed for the flow of information and culture and trade. Rosenberg argues that this is an important aspect of the progressive era because all parts of the United States could get the flow of new ideas and inventions. If liberal-developmentalism helped spread the flow of ideas then it can be recognized that it helped the spread of mass culture as well. Mass culture should also be considered as an important part of America’s cultural expansion and the author made sure to include it in her writing. Mass culture is important during this time period because it aided in the development of new sets of ideas and values. I believe the author mentioned liberal-developmentalism because she wanted the reader to recognize that this was an important part of the cultural and economic expansion and because it directly correlates to mass culture. Mass culture developed in this time period from the common exposure of the same news, media, art, and music. What I didn’t know before reading this chapter was how important liberal-developmentalism was during the 20th century. If you think about it,

America would not be as advanced as it is today without this ideology. America would not be a modern country without liberal-developmentalism. It can be recognized that this ideology was the reason for all the progress America made during the 1900’s. I don’t think that many people are aware about this ideology and I think it should be discussed more often. Rosenberg did an excellent job of describing why liberal-developmentalism is important and how it affected American during the time period.
The Columbian Exposition was just one example that displayed how American’s lives were changing because of the progressive era, and Rosenberg did an exceptional job discussing this. She proved that with the invention of new technology, American lives were becoming more convenient. This time period shaped the way that we as Americans live today. We are so used to a certain level of convenience and without the economic and cultural expansion, this convenience would not have been discovered. I believe Rosenberg provided multiple examples of the inventions created to show how dependent we are on these inventions today. I do believe that although the Columbia Exposition displayed how advanced America was becoming, Rosenberg mentioned it to show it was also a way for the Americans to gloat and show that they are more powerful than other countries. Rosenberg discusses how Americans flaunted their cheap mass production and technology, hoping they would spread throughout the world. I can infer from her writing that American wanted other countries to recognize their progression and new technology so these other countries would feel inferior to the United States. In this time period, the United States was striving to be stronger and more powerful than Europe and they accomplished that with the cultural and economic expansion.