The Transcendentalist Movement in the US

• Transcendentalism sprang up in the New England region of the

  United States during the nineteenth century
• Transcendentalists believed in a unifying theory of innate goodness in all people and subscribed to insight over logic in the search for truth
• Transcendentalist writer strongly emphasized alternative ways of living and advocated for women's right to vote, better conditions for workers, individual freedom, and other humanitarian causes
• Transcendentalists were critical of slavery and wrote many influential workers in support of social reforms
• American Transcendentalists were influenced by Unitarianism, German Transcendentalists, Plato's philosophies, and mysticism
• German Transcendentalists had earlier influenced the English Romantics
• As a movement, American Transcendentalism espoused individualism and the idea of the divine "Over-Soul," present in each person
• Ralph Waldo Emerson's concept of Over-Soul included the idea that all souls are linked to one another and that individuals contain the divine inside themselves
• The Transcendentalists were among the first Western thinkers to read Asian texts in translation, such as the Bhagavad Gita
• The Transcendentalists were heavily influenced by Asian belief systems, especially Indian religions
• Two of the most renowned Transcendentalists were Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson were great friends in
• Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson were prolific essay writers and abolitionists who believed in self-reliance and in the relationship between the soul and nature
• Self-reliance is the ida that individuals should trust their intuition over conforming to societal standards
• "Nature" (1836) was Ralph Waldo Emerson's first published essay
• "Nature" espoused Ralph Waldo Emerson's belief that man and nature were infinitely linked and that the divine could be found in nature if people were not distracted by the trivial demands of the world
• Walden and "Civil Disobedience" are Henry David Thoreau's best-known works
• Walden is a treatise on simple living
• "Civil Disobedience" is an essay
• Henry David Thoreau's time on Walden Pond was devoted one day to work and the other six to thinking about transcendental concerns as an economic and philosophical experiment
• Henry David Thoreau's time at Walden Pond became a deep study of nature and living on his own outside of societal boundaries for the better part of two years