Evolution of the American Dream - Thesis Example

Dis Rhetoric and the Mythology of the American Dream Introduction The dream of America hasbeen on the minds of people in the world for centuries, her fertile valleys, freedoms, and to her eventual ideological growth into a country of opportunity, has sparked the imagination of those who wish to do better, be better, and fulfill their destiny. America isn’t just a place, a destination at the end of a journey, but it is an idea that grows in the mind, full of expectation and hope. In order for that idea to take hold, it must first be discussed, a discourse of propaganda and advertisement that has created this imagery. Phrases and concepts such as ’the land of opportunity’, ’manifest destiny’, and ’the American dream’, all have promoted hope within those who would immigrate to her shores. Hope has been the fuel through which America has been built. In the 17th century when religious freedom was being battered through reconstruction of Christianity in Europe, America was a land in which the freedom to live according to the articles of faith of one’s own choosing existed. In the 18th century, the spark of political freedom was at the core of the philosophy of the land, a new nation blossoming through the beliefs of men who no longer wanted to live under the tyranny of colonialism. The 19th century was a time of growth, a new country getting on her feet through expansion while her ideologies were being challenged until she was ripped apart and put back together, rebuilt for a new strength that supported the underlying philosophies that had made the dream in the first place. By the 20th century, her strength resided firmly in her people, patriotism supporting worldwide efforts to expand the purposes of liberty. All the while, rhetoric and literary descriptivism provided a framework for the promotion of ‘the American dream’, a foundation from which the imaginations of those who were dissatisfied with their homelands could build hope and a plan which would bring them to her shores. Immigration was built upon suffering, long journeys on ships that many did not survive. It meant sacrificing family and friends who had generations of history. However, the tales of the new land throughout each of the centuries overwhelmed the thought of such sacrifices and men and women took hold of that dream and set their life on a course to meet the challenges it would hold. Each of the time periods held literary pieces of promotion that supported the building of that dream. Defining the American Dream The concept of ‘the American dream’ can be summed up in one thought; that a person can find their success through their own ambitions rather than the imposed problems that are brought about by others who would rule their belief systems and set their social class. If one word is to be used to define the American dream, that word would be freedom (Swake 4). One of the ways in which it has been described, that dream defined through a targeted sense of hope, is through the promotional phrase ‘the land of opportunity’. According to Loewen, ‘the land of opportunity’ is an empowering myth, the intent being that by virtue of believing in that myth, one can make it true (217). There is a difference between the actual meaning of the words and the myth. The myth of ‘the land of opportunity’ is not that anyone can come to the United States and be successful, but that anyone who comes to the United States will be successful. The myth of the phrase is in contrast to the offer that it actually makes. In the myth of ’the land of opportunity’, success flows from unending fountains of power and wealth that are an endless flow into the pockets of her people. However, understanding the myth is very different than understanding the true meaning of opportunity. An opportunity is a chance, and that is what has been offered within the borders of the United States. Everyone has a chance to navigate the problems and suffer through challenges that the opportunity for success holds in order to become the success of their dreams. Offering a chance is not the same as offering a pot of gold to someone. What is done with that chance is how the dream is fulfilled. Rifkin describes this sense of the chance as he states that “America was always meant to be a land of ‘equal opportunity’ but not a land of ‘equality of results“ (12). One of the problems that has caused this misunderstanding of the journey towards the American dream is that the reality of that journey has not always been fully revealed to those who would take that chance. When people first started to arrive to form colonies and settlements, America was a wild place in comparison to European standards. There was an indigenous population that had to be considered as well as undeveloped land that would take a great deal of energy to prepare for creating a safe place to live. The opposite problem might be considered in modern society where so many paths have already been traveled towards success that they are a bit worn and crumbling. However, those paths still exist. Coming to the United States has never been an act that would guarantee success, only opportunities towards those ends. 17th Century Exploration and Migration According to Ruland and Bradbury, “the original tale was a religious one of travail and wandering, with the Lord’s guidance, in a quest of higher purpose and a millennial history” (9). The history of the Puritans is one of oppression, the ascetic lifestyle in which they had found their sense of God reviled as blasphemy by both the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church. They were persecuted for their beliefs which led them to characterize themselves as martyrs for their cause. According to Corbett and Corbett, “The Puritans saw themselves in a very special light. In the biblical exodus, Jews escaped from Egypt to travel to a new land promised to them by God. The Puritans saw themselves as the new chosen people and the new world was the new Israel” (33). The Puritans only lasted until 1660 in Europe, but they lasted into the 18th century in the new world, their new home a place of religious refuge. It is notable, however, to understand the linguistic framework with which the plight of the Puritans is discussed. Note how in the previous description nobility is transferred upon them, a mix of fortitude and innocence that increases the power of the myth of ‘the American Dream’. In school, children are taught about the first Thanksgiving, the interaction between the indigenous population of Native Americans and the Puritans an amicable and loving celebration in which the new migrants were given tools through agriculture with which to survive, while the meeting was then celebrated with a feast. It is the myth of religious freedom that fuels the power of the myth of the American dream. As much as the Puritans were seeking their own freedom from persecution, they were a brutal group of believers whose ascetic lifestyle was imposed upon their own to the point of severe punishment and retribution for not conforming. Nichols describes them as “fine purveyors of hypocrisy, rigidity, misogyny, and patriarchal domination“ (99).The tales of Hawthorne with The Scarlet Letter, and the play by Arthur Miller, The Crucible which both describe the difficulty of living as a Puritan, are only a mere snapshot. Nichols equate this with the concept of a picture of Hawaii as compared to a visit to the Islands, the picture not being near descriptive enough of the actual experience (99). However, when Charles I came to the throne in England in 1625, the need for the Puritans to leave their homes and find a new world became imperative. Archbishop William Laud, under the reign of Charles I, became powerful within the church and he made sure that the laws against non-conformity within the Church were enforced, jailing, torturing, and burning those who were considered to be blasphemers and against the religious interests of the state (Nichols 102). The new world represented a new freedom from this type of oppression, worth the risk of the difficult and deadly ocean crossing into a new land that required back breaking work to harness under the yoke of civilized politicized communities. The story holds romance and nobility, creating the foundation of Western migration to the new land, a land that would embrace and protect the freedom of belief. This became a powerful resource from which to create a sense of the ideological meaning of America. The irony, of course, is that the Puritans were a people who would also burn blasphemers, put people into the stocks for the slightest of offenses, and embrace the hysteria of young girls as they accused a series of people of witchcraft, their accusations leading to trials where confessions were brought through torture and the lack of a confession resulted in death through heinous means. Still, these people and the freedom from their own oppressors create the rhetoric and oral traditions of supporting the freedoms through which America bases its ideological myths. Building a Country on Ideology The new world became a place where men and women would come to escape their old lives and establish a new existence, the pressures of a highly structured governmental system replaced by the hardships of an untamed world. However, European influences still grasped the settlers within their fist, the British squeezing their colonists until revolution was the only answer. The beginnings of migration that were inspired by the concepts of freedom were then extended towards the formation of a nation based upon ideological principles, a new way in which to form a state. While the battles against the British troops were significant, it was the battle waged with words that formed the nation. As Thomas Jefferson wrote “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union”, he began a discourse through which defining what was meant by freedom became the underlying conversation that made a nation (DeKoven 128). While most states had been formed through economic need and the growth of power through a leader, the nation of the United States was formed through ideological discourse on what it should mean to live under a government. The United States was formed upon the power of language rather than solely upon the might of a sword. When the dream of a nation built upon the needs of her people became a reality, the world stood in awe. The migration to the new world was increased through the concepts upon which the myths of that land were spread. The new world was a place where farmers and craftsmen could take up arms and defeat a crown. To the people of other nations whose own lives were being oppressed and their ability to succeed impeded by governments that did not seem to care about their needs, the land that was America seemed a place where possibilities were around every corner. The myth of the ’American dream’ became a powerful, alive concept that held a promise. Where throughout history the right to rule had been taken by force and reinforced by concepts of royal divinity, the right to rule in the United States became subject to the words that men could write. Where philosophy had held a place in all nations, history does not show that it held a place in creating nations, shaping them sometimes, yes, but not in founding them. Through the creation of a state that was formed upon principles and philosophical concepts, the United States create the hope through which the doors were opened and the keys to her lands were handed over to the people who lived within their borders. The concept of the self-made man become predominant over that of the remnants of the feudal system where success was owed to those who gave patronage, rather than through self-motivation. The age of Enlightenment joined the industrial age in creating a middle class in Europe that could make their fortunes on their on merit rather than through the pyramid of the feudal system. This philosophy could be deepened within the United States. Through the promise of freedom from tyranny and the hope of making a life through the spirit of independence, the self-made man came to America to seek his fortunes without owing them to someone whose station was above his own. In America, he was equal, and this made all the difference in how life was lived. The 19th Century The 19th century can be divided into two conceptual parts from which the dream of the American landscape was perpetuated. The first was through the expansion into the Western territories. According to Blake, “Speculation about the meaning of the American West, a landscape that occupies center stage in American folklore, is more profitable with an understanding of the evolution of ideas that are attached to the place”(202). The concept of the American West was shaped, not only through stories that were told from one person to the next, but through the tales that were fashioned by newspapers, magazines, and novels about rugged individuals who were taming a wild land, full of romance and danger. The rhetoric of the West was so powerful that it was adapted by shows like the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show, which ran from the 1870’s until 1910, to give a taste of the myths of the West to those living in the East. The West became a subject of artistic interest with paintings, novels and eventually films all participating in the discourse that would suggest that the region was a place of mythological adventure. The concept of the cowboy and the entire theoretical literary context in which he was presented becoming the foundation for a desire for some to test their measure against the harsh lands, seeking fortune and sometimes fame. The cowboy became a representation of becoming more than human, his heroism and power to tame his environment filling the spirit of those who would try their luck in those lands with the hope of putting more meaning, and often more profit, into their lives. The 19th century also was a time when the new nation was tested, the freedoms that had been extended to all European born individuals now being measured against the hypocrisy of slavery. In this case, freedom became tested, the theories of white male Americans now held before them to create a world in which the power of their philosophies were put into practice. The country was torn in half, the concept of freedom tested, and the discourse about the philosophy of a nation tested through the reality of the people who turned on each other to settle the matter. In the end, the philosophy of freedom won and a history of slavery was put to rest, the aftermath echoing throughout the next century as the fight for social equality would be equally as fervent as the fight for physical freedoms. Money and Power The early 20th century became a child of the industrialization of nations, the philosophies of Enlightenment that had fueled the sense of individuality coupled with the rise in income of the middle classes through industrialized commerce providing a framework in which capitalism would become the forefront of economic theory. The sense of capitalism had always been the economic foundation of the nation, but with the rise of the corporate world run through the working class who fueled the needs of factories, provided a wealthy elite that had been born from the same stock that had birthed most of the men of the nation, none having been conceived with a royal spoon in their mouths. Still, these men came into power and wealth through shrewd investing and sometimes ruthless practices that gave the hope to the every man that he could attain the same status and financial position. An example of this is Henry Ford who invented the Model T automobile, designed the concept of the assembly line, and then made the automobile affordable to his own workers (Ford and Crowther 5). Through innovation, he built a company that still exists to this day. They myth of the man is the power that fuels the dream. However, it has also led to some ruinous times in which the dream became a nightmare. During the 1920’s the stock market became a powerful economic force that fueled the dreams of many through actual dollars, wealth swelling until it burst, the burden of buying on margin, which basically meant through promised money rather than actual money, bankrupted the nation and plummeted it into a depression that diminished the American dream. Recovery was slow, and it led towards a terrible war that stretched across the globe, but rallied once again a nation toward patriotic duty, her people sacrificing through rationing in the hope of victory once again over tyranny and oppression. This time, the people supported a global community that needed their help, although galvanized by the events of Pearl Harbor towards vengeance and the might of righteousness. This period of time would lead to the greatest power of the myth, the American dream becoming a reality within the world through the innovations that would occur during that war. Conclusion Even in writing this essay, the power of the framework of phrasing supports the growth of the myth that is the American dream. The dream exists within the hope of every man and woman that their lives can be improved, their own ambitions fueling their success unhindered by governments and social systems that prevent them from rising to the top of their chosen course. In many other places in the world, this dream isn’t possible, birth into a social class or the limits of governmental interference preventing such personal growth. However, the dream that is America is founded upon the idea that a man or woman should be able to rise to any station in life through hard work and exploitation of proper opportunities. While the reality of that dream is far more complicated, the ideology of the mythology is powerful and has drawn immigrants from all over the world to participate in their chance, giving life to their hopes and dreams. The ways in which the discourse of the American dream has infiltrated the hopes of people on a worldwide level is proof of the power of words as they promote the philosophies, the mythologies, and the concepts that are America, despite her realities. Works Cited Blake, Kevin S. “Zane Grey and the Images of the American West”. Geographical Review. 85, 2 (April 1985): 202-216. Print. Corbett, Michael and Julia Mitchell Corbett. Politics and Religion in the United States. New York: Taylor and Francis, Inc. Print. DeKoven, Marianne. Utopia Limited: The Sixties and the Emergence of the Postmodern. Post- contemporary interventions. Durham: Duke University Press, 2004. Print. Ford, Henry, and Samuel Crowther. My Life and Work. Stillwell, KS: Digireads.com, 2006. Print. Hamilton, Neil A. Rebels and Renegades: A Chronology of Social and Political Dissent in the United States. New York: Taylor and Francis, Inc. Print. Loewen, James W. Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong. New York: New Press, 2008. Print. Nichols, Stephen J. The Reformation: How a Monk and a Mallet Changed the World. Wheaton, Ill: Crossway, 2007. Print. Rifkin, Jeremy. The European Dream: How Europes Vision of the Future Is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2005. Print. Ruland, Richard, and Malcolm Bradbury. From Puritanism to Postmodernism: A History of American Literature. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1992. Print. Swake, Jessica. The Reception of the American Dream in Tennessee Williams’ play ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ and Arthur Miller’s play ‘Death of a Salesman’. Norderstedt, Germany: Verlag, 2005. Print. Read More