Coordinates of liminality: Emerson, Fuller, and the landscape of empire

Lynn A Searfoss, Purdue University

Abstract

This project examines the rhetorical construction of place and self in the writing of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Margaret Fuller and argues that it must be understood as revealing the contradictions of a nation poised between settler colonialism and imperialism. Written against a backdrop of disparaging European texts like those produced by Frances Trollope and Charles Dickens, and in part addressed to European readers, these works of self-enculturation display postcolonial ambivalence as they simultaneously declare independence from and maintain connection with their colonial past. At the same time, Emerson's continual emphasis on the acquisition of individual power inevitably colludes with the competitive ideology at the heart of empire-building while Fuller often glosses over the politics of domination and even celebrates westward expansion as a sign of progress. Chapter One provides a brief introduction to theories of settler postcolonial nationalism and their relevance for understanding the literature of the antebellum United States. Chapters Two and Three examine Emerson's and Fuller's investigations into the importance of aesthetic perception as foundational to individual and social health. Chapter Four discusses the significance of journalism as a form of travel writing crucial to the development of national identity. Chapter Five foregrounds Emerson's analysis of the conditions of national and imperial power. Key texts examined in this project include Emerson's Nature and English Traits and Fuller's Summer on the Lakes and selected articles from the New York Tribune as well as Dickens's American Notes , Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America, and Frances Trollope's Domestic Manners of the Americans.

Degree

Ph.D.

Advisors

Oreovicz, Purdue University.

Subject Area

American literature

COinS