Comparative Construction and Diffusion of Cultural Paradigms in the U.S. and Europe in the 19th Century

Annotation

OBJECTIVES Comparative construction and diffusion of cultural paradigms in Europe and the U.S. in the nineteenth century. This course will compare the impact of two seemingly quite different foliations of romanticism that manifested themselves on respective sides of the Atlantic Ocean during this period: linguistic-historicist romanticism on the eastern shore and subjective-individualist romanticism on the western. The course will examine the origin, content, rhetoric, consequences, and implications of the ethnic, collective, and authoritarian cultural paradigms that grew out of (and into) European nation-states, particularly during the various "national revivals" among "subject nationalities/ ethnicities," to the anti-ethnic, individual, and anti-authoritarian cultural paradigm(s) that received classic formulation and valorization in the United States as part of the so-called American Renaissance during approximately the same period. Attention will also be paid to the means, strategies, and organizational formations by which these respective paradigms attained cultural hegemony in their respective spheres. With the content outlines and valorization techniques of the respective cultural models articulated, an effort will then be made to examine (at the meta- level) the structure and functioning of the dynamics that produced these cultural constructions and whether they are logically and procedurally consistent and compatible with the cultural processes and products which have come to be considered characteristic of the contrasting cultural spheres which they purport to delineate. Readings will include works by Berlin, Herder, Fichte, Hegel, Emerson, Higham, Anderson, and other American and European commentators on romanticism and its cultural/political manifestations. Course content

1) Valorization of hierarchy and deference in traditional European (landlord-tenant) socio-economic and religious structure

2) Valorization of cultural authority and authoritative institutions in European national (nation-state) romanticism

3) Valorization of the individual as an agent, vehicle, of the national culture in European national (nation-state) romanticism

4) Valorization of membership in a specific ethnic/racial group as validation for entitlement to rights of equal participation/citizenship in the political formation representing and protecting that ethnic/racial group (nation-state) in European national (nation-state) romanticism

5) Valorization of cultural and ethnic/racial "purity" in European national (nation-state) romanticism, and of class exclusiveness by traditional European socio-economic structure

6) Valorization of government/authority/knowledgeable and/or experienced "experts" as decision-makers and initiators of action and projects by traditional European valorizations of hierarchy and deference

7) Devalorization of hierarchy and deference in traditional American (freehold tenure) socio-economic and (radical Protestant) religious structure

8) Devalorization of cultural authority and authoritative institutions in traditional American frontier utilitarian rejection of ethnic solidarity or hegemony

9) Valorization of the individual as a self-constructing consciousness and independent agent responsible for her/his own well-being and salvation by American radical Protestant religious culture and American individual romanticism/subjective Idealism

10) Devalorization of membership in a specific ethnic/racial group as validation for entitlement to rights of equal participation/citizenship in the political formation representing and protecting that ethnic/racial group (nation-state) resulting from American valorization of the rejection of ethnic solidarity and cultural hegemony as a basis for membership in frontier utilitarian American society

11) Devalorization of cultural and ethnic/racial "purity" in an American anti-hegemonic frontier utilitarian society, a traditional economic framework of ubiquitous freehold tenure, an American radical Protestant environment of spiritual egalitarianism and personal autonomy, and an American culture of individual romanticism/subjective Idealism

12) Devalorization of government/authority/knowledgeable and/or experienced "experts" as decision-makers and initiators of action and projects by traditional American valorizations of non-hierarchy and non-deference, resulting in a widespread initiation of non-governmental and non-expert action and products by individual agents, often working through a traditional American methodology of voluntary association