Transcendentalism
Hannah Bredl, Mike Diana, Joe
McFarland, and Cody Siegfried
What is it?




It was a mid-nineteenth century movement of
literature and philosophy (1830-1855).
It was a belief of a spiritual state that
“transcends” the physical and the empirical that
can be realized by the individual
Transcendentalists believed in self-reliance, selfculture, and self-discipline.
Transcendentalism caused changes in literature
and sparked social reform.
How did it start?



American transcendentalism has its roots in New
England, specifically Boston, Massachusetts (called “the
Athens of America”).
Transcendentalists were influenced by Immanuel Kant,
German transcendentalism, Asian religious scriptures,
and Platonism and Neo-Platonism.
They disagreed with Unitarianism and John Locke’s
theory that knowledge comes to the mind from the
senses.
Theories

Truth goes beyond the senses and cannot be found by
observation alone. Everyone is capable of finding the
truth and can be put in direct touch with god (oversoul)
without scholars or ministers for interpretation.


This idea of inner light is borrowed from the Quakers.
Yet even though transcendentalism generally believed
the same things, each person had different ideas and
beliefs that separated them from one another.
Famous Transcendentalists

Henry David Thoreau

Walt Whitman

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Margaret Fuller
Definition

Transcendentalism is defined as any philosophy
based upon the doctrine that the principles of
reality are to be discovered by the study of the
process of thought, or a philosophy emphasizing
the intuitive and spiritual above the empirical

All that means is that whatever they were rebelling
for they saw what was going on around them and
made that be what they wanted to be different from
Romanticism

Romanticism is defined as an artistic style
emphasizing imagination and emotion
What’s
the
difference?
Relationship

Romanticism
Viewed nature as perfect and man as flawed
 Focused on self more


Transcendentalism
Viewed nature as symbolic and that nature provided
answers about virtue and wisdom
 Believed the individual was the ultimate spiritual
being that you can derive all truth and knowledge
from.

Relationship cont.

Romanticism
Value of emotion(stories to be felt by the reader and
inspire them)
 Nature is a living mystery (not like clockwork like
rationalists)


Transcendentalism

God is the compilation of all individual souls on
Earth that when you die, your soul transcends too
What Impact did
Transcendentalism
Have on America?
"Without Emerson and Thoreau," notes Professor
Ashton Nichols, "the United States would not
have developed into the nation it has become.
We would not believe in the power of the
individual to the extent that we do, nor would
we see nature at the center of one view of the
American psyche.”
The extraordinary members of this informal
movement provided intellectual and moral
leadership for not only art, and literary
transformations but greatly in social
transformations in America. The influence of
their ideas continues today in many aspects of
our culture, from efforts to preserve wild nature
to civil disobedience around the world.

Transcendentalism was cause of….
›
Classrooms becoming a vibrant and even
pleasurable experience.




Class rooms would still be a very strict place
No type of recess for younger kids
If you had any sort of trouble there was no extra help
which is why school was so difficult..
Established slavery as morally wrong
›
With out these ideas its possible slavery wouldn’t had been
abolished until later years

Transcendentalism was cause of….
›
Women's rights

›
›
As for women, this movement was very important for
their equal rights
Certain theologies
Love for nature

Which is good to keep a love for nature but also gave way
to tree huggers.

Transcendentalism was cause of….
›
Ability to discover personal truths

The source of our distinctly American way of
experiencing ourselves


Transcendentalism brought a feeling of focusing on
oneself and learning about yourself
Confidence in our value as individuals
Walt Whitman











Born – May 31, 1819
Long Island New York
Neither of his parents read his poetry
Forced to drop out of school at age 9 to
support his family
Read a lot mainly Homer, Dante, and
Shakespeare
Age 17 was a teacher (1836)
1841 he was a journalist
Editor for newspapers in Brooklyn and
New Orleans
1850 he created a new kind of poetry
Got inspiration from music
Died in 1892
Whitman’s Famous Poems





“When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed”
“O captain! My Captain!” (1866)
“A Noiseless Patient Spider”
“Leaves of Grass”
“Song of Myself”
Ralph Waldo Emerson









Born Boston 1803
Grew up in Boston, and went to
Harvard
Class poet at Harvard
Friends with Napoleon's Nephew
Was a teacher at a Women’s school
Originally a minister, but left for
his love of writing
Toured Europe
Considered a essayist, philosopher,
and poet
Died in 1882
Emerson’s Works







“Nature”- 1850
“The American Scholar” – 1837
His many Representative Men
“The Naturalist”- 1834
The Lord’s Supper
“Bacchus”
“Merlin”
Sarah Margaret Fuller











Born: 1810 Cambridgeport MA
Very good education for a girl at
her time
Best read person in New England
Journalist and translator
Knew Latin
Looked up to her father
Tought at Temple School in
Boston
Editor of The Dial Emerson’s
journal
Literary Critic for the New York
Tribune
Sent to Europe for the Tribune
Died 1850
Fuller’s Works



Summer on the Lakes - 1844
Woman in the Nineteenth Centruy - 1845
Papers on Literature and Art - 1846
Bronson Alcott












Born: 1799 Wolcott CT
Philosopher, teacher, reformer
Self- Educated
Was a peddler in the south
Established many schools for
Children
Influenced by Johann H.
Pestalozzi, and Socrates
Had to close his schools
Sold them to rid him of debt
Fan of “Utopian” Communities
Father of Louisa May Alcott
In debt a lot
Died 1888
Alcott’s Works



Wrote for Emerson’s The Dial
“Orphic Sayings”
Fruitlands- his utopian community
Henry David Thoreau









Born: 1817 Concord MA
Author, poet, naturalist,
philosopher
Leading Transcendentalist
Studied at Harvard
Doesn’t have a diploma from
Harvard
Wrote about nature and being in
nature
Lived by himself in a cabin at
Walden Pond to be in nature
Went against the grain, anarchist
Died 1862
Thoreau’s Works







Walden or Life in the Woods- 1854
Excursions- 1863
“On the Duty of Civil Disobedience” 1849
“Paradise Regained” – 1843
“Slavery in Massachusetts”- 1854
“Walking” – 1861
…. To name a few
Works Cited
"Bronson Alcott." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 16 May. 2010
<http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/13464/Bronson-Alcott>.
“Henry David Thoreau.” American History. ABC-CLIO, 2010. Web. 23 Mar. 2010.
<http://www.americanhistory.abc-clio.com>.
Kennedy, David M, Lizabeth Cohen, and Thomas Bailey. “Trumpeters of Transcendentalism.” The
American Pageant. 14th ed. Boston: Wadsworth, 2010. 361-364. Print.
“Margaret Fuller.” American History. ABC-CLIO, 2010. Web. 23 Mar. 2010.
<http://www.americanhistory.abc-clio.com>.
“New England Renaissance.” American History. ABC-CLIO, 2010. Web. 23 Mar. 2010.
<http://www.americanhistory.abc-clio.com>.
“Ralph Waldo Emerson.” American History. ABC-CLIO, 2010. Web. 23 Mar. 2010.
<http://www.americanhistory.abc-clio.com>.
Seckinger, Ernie. “American Transcendentalism.” Windstream. The Thoreau Society, 29 June 2008.
Web. 22 Mar. 2010. <http://home.windstream.net>.
“Transcendentalism.” Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica Online School Edition, n.d.
Web. 22 Mar. 2010. <http://www.school.eb.com/eb/article-9073185>.
“Transcendentalism.” Transcendentalism. N.p., n.d. Web. 2 May 2010.
<http://www.themystica.com/mystica/articles/t/transcendentalism.html>.
“Walt Whitman.” American Poems. Gunnar Bengtsson, n.d. Web. 28 Apr. 2010.
<http://www.americanpoems.com/poets/waltwhitman>.
Quiz




1. What do transcendentalists believe?
2. Who influenced the transcendentalists?
3. Name one of the most famous
transcendentalists.
4. True or false…. Transcendentalists liked to be
one with nature?
Answers




1. They believe the truth can transcend through
reflection and observation
2. Germans like Immanuel Kant and religions of
Asia
3. Henry David Thoreau (but answers may vary)
4. True!