LITR 4232: American Renaissance
University of Houston-Clear Lake, spring 2003
Sample Student Research Project

Corrie Lawrence
LITR 4232
Dr. Craig White
04-19-03

Exploring American Renaissance Literature:

Domestic Space and Ideals of the American Romantic Female

I.                    Introduction

Family is an unavoidable fact of human history.  It does not matter what the age or events, its presence is as inescapable and repetitive as the “begats” of the Bible.  For man to continue there needs be a mother, and for child to thrive there needs be provision; thus, the cohesive unit we call a family is formed, clinging together to better the chance of survival and perpetuation. The resulting relations are what traditionally have been considered the building blocks of community, and for ages individual and collective identities have been derived by peoples all over the world by means of tracing lineage either through patrilineal or matrilineal descent. 

In medieval, times knights engaged the enemy bearing enormous shields, banners, and armor emblazoned with the identifying marks of his house of origin.  Loyalties and economies were secured through family ties.  Dynasties, crowns, wealth, and power were once all established, secured and perpetuated according to blood relation and family name.  With the New World came also a new order; the mother-country is left behind, the mother-tongue eventually abandoned, and in a further-reaching generalization our new order is poised to give ‘the mother’ a gradually waning role of importance.  Though America has not altogether abandoned the idea of family legacy, (examples of former-President George Bush, current President George W. Bush, and the Kennedy family are readily accessible), these are few and far between.  The common American family generally is not thus defined.  As a result of a mingled cup of innumerable causes, more and more modern American culture affords less emphasis to, finds less to capitalize on, and sees less need for the cohesive family unit.  Current research affirms the diminishing strength of family in the United States, simply affirming of this obvious degradation that “the trend is real and continuing,” (17 Goode). 

This condition is exceedingly complex, and it is “nearly impossible to disentangle cause from effect in this process,” (15). Many a theory has been put forth; no concrete answers have been found.

In light of the fact that families, extended, tribal, and otherwise, have been not only a product of, but also contributing force of a broader cultural evolution and development of societies throughout the ages, I have designed to take up a study of the family as it pertains to the American literature and culture of the American Renaissance.  More specifically, I intend to narrow in on the topic of the female role within the family unit and the domestic scene, while looking out at the ripples of the grander implications of the domestic culture, when possible.    

II.            Initiating Interest

In contemplating this subject I find myself beset with numerous questions, some of which all sociological and anthropological probing leaves without conclusion or reliable theory: What is to be said of this constantly changing political and ideological feminine landscape that we encounter in America?  What can we say of the present era that I would contend could reasonably be touted the “Female Identity Crisis”?  How many full-time jobs, how many hats, and how many titles must the modern woman assume before reaching a place of fulfillment, before she “finds herself” or attains any semblance of self-actualization?  Must she be all of mother, wife, lover, friend, sister, scholar, employee, nurse, CEO, teacher, counselor, activist, consumer, and citizen as the current trend in American society insists? 

And what is it that divides, or perhaps bridges, this era that faces the modern woman from that in which gender roles were far more circumspect and succinct in definition?  For that matter, what can be ascertained as to where this trend of familial evolution or disintegration, (the word one desires to use varies with personal prejudice), is headed.  This locomotive seems to have commenced with the Industrial Revolution, only to perpetually climb in velocity, and one must ask when we will encounter the final destination, if there is one to encounter, and what will that be? 

It is not for nostalgic, delusion-driven longing to see a simpler time that I broach these issues, but rather out of a true curiosity and concern regarding the condition of the family.  As it is often glibly suggested, we must understand our past to take hold of and understand the present. It is from a perspective of New Historicism that I examine these issues, desiring to make sense of the shifting American domestic life.  Sociologist, William J. Goode is not alone in his lament that, “the disintegration of the family is a threat to social cohesion itself,” (15).  In light of this “real and continuing trend” Goode points out that “we are [engaged] with a set of significant social problems” (17).  Out of concern for our America, it is in the best interest to put study to this frightening phenomenon.     What are these forces that thwart the cohesion of the historical, and thus the modern, family?  So many questions persist, and yet one can pose a question with ease; it is exponentially more difficult to answer such queries. This, however, is the mindset with which I approach this project.  Modern issues drive me to peruse the conditions of the past, and I acknowledge that even with lengthy examination, it is a hard task make light of extensively complex issues, and even more foolish to personally lay claim to definite answers.

Instead, I will be consoled with a much more focused and simple examination. Through a lens of female perspective, navigating female authored and centered literature of the time, I have resolved to explore the attitudes and circumstances and context surrounding mid 19th century feminine identity.

Most of the literature from which we can glean information and insight into the domestic realm of Renaissance American is authored by women.  The female popular literature of the time takes up specific issues, generally centered around home and hearth; issues of virtue, motherhood, sentiment, and duty.  Some of these authors give evidence of great concern for the life and events that transpired beyond the threshold, and employed their talents in pursuing things of the outer realm as well. (Harriet Beecher Stowe, for example). 

It remains to be acknowledged that not all female writers on the scene in this time frame where domestically preoccupied.  We are so reminded by intellectuals such as Margaret Fuller and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  These women afford mention in this composition, as they are indicative of the evolving sentiment among the female community and also serve as representative of the increasingly educated community of women seeking an identity outside of both the private sphere and traditional role afforded to the female citizens.

III.            Defining Home: More than a Space

“Beyond just a measure of their financial prosperity, a home was a mirror of the family's happiness and virtue. Once a center of production and an economic as much as a social unit, in the nineteenth century the family - and the single-family dwelling - became understood as a sanctuary from the harsh, demanding world outside,” (Riedy). With the Industrial Revolution came a shift in the focal point of the home.  The agricultural farm-life was no longer the dominant American model, and the purpose of the house itself and the land surrounding it had changed as well.  Now the home was the place of rest for the working citizen, and the gathering place for a family, that instead of working together daily, now dispersed to different locations to earn a wage.  As a result the home was redefined.

In light of this redefining, the home became even more so the female domain, if the female did remain at home.  Yet, some contemporary critics hold that even given the absence of business in the home, there still remained a great merit to be given to the impact of the home on the outside world.  One such critic contends that “to understand home as only a fulfillment of man's need for shelter is to ignore the place it holds in the imagination, and when speaking of nineteenth-century America, is to deny a powerful cultural force.,” (Riedy).

The home is where traditionalists, like Harriet Beecher Stowe, felt that the values were instilled and minds and lives first shaped.  Modern scholars, well-versed in the popular literature of the 19th century woman agree that this was the prevailing view: “The atmosphere of the home was seen as having an almost mystical effect on its inhabitants, determining their moral standards, happiness, and success in the outside world,” (Wolfe).

An interesting note to the credit of the African American women in the day is that the home represented to the emancipated or escaped slave a setting in which to establish dominion and influence. “[The] woman’s sphere possessed its own importance inherent power and offered women a crack in a once tightly sealed door, a wasy to effect change.”  Commentators of the time continue in claim that the jobs inclusive of the domestic governance was not merely housekeeping, but the keeping of “Bodies, spirits, and souls.”  To be a mother was synonymous with one who instills virtue and moral character.  The mother not only cooked and cleaned for the houses inhabitants but also served to “nurse…regulate and police,” (Wolfe).

 IV.      Cult of True Womanhood

The idea of the ‘Cult of True Womanhood’ is defined by Terry Eagleton, in an article commenting on the ideologies of this period as they pertain to slaves. This crucial term that is repeated again and again by various scholars is used in reference to the ideals of the female identity as perceived in the Romantic era, as well as in previous times.  Eagleton explains:

 ”The domestic cult of true womanhood stressed and celebrated woman’s intrinsically assumed higher morality, the display of which woman was supposed to use to influence men and the ‘unfortunate.’  The cult of true womanhood lies in the woman’s ‘inherent’ domestic skills expressed through reigning over the home and all its interior issues of child rearing and house keeping.”

 

“True Womanhood’s” historical roots are explained by scholar Maureen E. Riedy in an outline of American Renaissance domestic life.  She explains that historian Barbara Welter’s 1966 essay on domestic matters has greatly impacted today’s comprehension of the middle class woman's place in 19th century America. In "The Cult of True Womanhood: 1820-70" Welter asserts there to be “four… attributes seen as pillars of True Womanhood - piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity.”  Welter believed that together these attributes “spelled mother, daughter, sister, wife - woman. Without them, no matter whether there was fame, achievement or wealth, all was ashes. With them she was promised happiness and power" (Riedy).

V.             Economy of Family And Family as Wealth

The ‘True Womanhood’s’ emphasis on the importance of fulfilling the traditional familial role of wife and matriarch is one generally held as narrow and outdated as the drastic shift in family composition, commitment, and hierarchy has been wrought in the last two-hundred or more years.   Goode comments on this shift asserting that “over...very likely more than two centuries, the trend in family changes seems to be toward a weakening in family controls.” He continues to state his theory for this change in economical language:”I have characterized the widespread decrease in people’s willingness to make long-term investments in the collectivity of the family because the probable payoff is not good enough,” (Goode 17). 

Harriet Beecher Stowe, contrastingly, exemplifies the inverse of the modern trend.  In correspondence to a female companion she claims of her family and role therein, “My children I would not change for all the ease, leisure, and pleasure that I could have without them. They are money on interest whose value will be constantly increasing,” (Stowe).  To a woman of this era, whose worth in the community was dictated by her industry in the home, her children were the measure of her increase and attentive motherhood was perceived as the cultivation and care to ensure the interest.

VI.       The Domestic Plight of the Female Slave

Significance is to be duly assigned here to the domestic condition of the African American slave population.  Especially in the South where slavery persisted despite much controversy, it is a recognized very real contributor to current culture. 

Important literary texts for this purpose include Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and the considerably more realistically composed, Harriet Ann Jacobs's personal slave narrative, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.   In Stowe’s portrayal of the plight of the American female slave, she gives to the public an intimate example the helplessness in motherhood and of household imagery. We see in the plight of Eliza, as she flees to save her son from being sold, that the slave mother had no authority, even in the tending of her offspring. No house to her can be home, so long as she and her children are in bondage. 

In comparison, Jacobs recounts for the reader, first-hand the stuff of Stowe’s fiction.  She personally shares the tale of her flight from slavery and her quest as a mother to spare her children from the weighty oppression she endures.  

In  Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Jacobs's struggles for freedom among a network of family, community, and relationships. In this autobiographical work, great insight is lent into the particulars of the female slave life. 

She takes us into various homes and reveals again the powerlessness of the slave mother in the care of her children.  This point is perhaps best illustrated by the months spent cloistered in the tiny attic compartment, unknown to her children and impotent as their caregiver. So long as she remained a captive to slavery, she was both physically and figuratively immobilized in mothering her children or heading a home.

The domestic ideology of “True Womanhood” ascribed to by Stowe and countless of her contemporaries was not effective for slaves such as Jacobs.  The universality of motherhood and domestic governance was undermined, thus ineffective in any slave’s life by the manipulation of motherhood and the perversion of the ideal of home.  This idea is further developed in an analysis of Jacob’s relationship with Mr. Flint. 

Mr. Flint attempts to establish a separate dwelling for Jacobs outside of his wife’s sight.  Though Jacobs would have enjoyed her own space, she recognizes his plot as a means to secretly entertain his lusts on her.  The cottage becomes s a picture of a house of horror for her.  Though her current residence offers her few, if any, of the comforts of an idealized home, the prospective cottage is only a further perversion of the already upside-down ideal of home Jacobs lives with. 

Out of spite for her owner and as a means to thwart Mr. Flint’s plot, Jacob begins a relationship with another white man.  In doing so, she recognizes that she is violating the values set forth by her deceased mother (note the presence of the maternal moral voice) as well as the code of conduct adhered to by her grandmother.  Nevertheless, she knowingly takes the step that would condemn her by the cult of “True womanhood,” piety, and domesticity.

She concedes in her narrative, “I know I did wrong…[But] in looking back, calmly, on the events of my life, I feel that slave women ought not to be judged by the same standards as others.”  Because she feels that this code governing female behavior did not save her from danger, she asks that mercy be shown towards her desperate actions and deviation from the social mores. "Slavery is terrible for men, but it is far more terrible for women," she states (Jacobs), and so she feels that crossing and blurring lines is permissible in certain cases.

A historical phenomenon worth noting is that “for turn of the century blacks set on racial uplift, female purity becomes a significant trope for discussing racial equality,” (Wolf).  This is evidenced in scads of popular literature aimed at emancipated female slave pertaining to the instruction of proper behavior, values, and housekeeping.  Women’s magazines broached these usually unmentioned issues as well, reemphasizing the traditional role of a woman, and the importance of conforming to the pre-established social norms piety, purity, and submission.

Jacobs is recognized in her narrative as an exception to many a rule in her largely unprecedented frankness about the sexual aspects of her life.  She is noted by scholar Amy Wolf as having a “sharp, specific focus on the sexual exploitation of slave women. Other narrators had touched on this issue to be sure, but none had explored it with the depth and passion of Jacobs.” In effort to add emphasis to the injustices of the slavery, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl she crosses boundaries, with the intent to effect change. “Jacobs had to break deliberately with the genteel…literary and social conventions that ruled certain subjects, particularly sex and sexuality, out of bounds. Jacobs knew that, judged by the standards of the cult of true womanhood,” (Wolf).

Whether speaking about physical safety or merely of comfort, home did not and could not mean the same thing to the enslaved woman and to the free.  The slave woman was not the mistress of the house, and was not protected within the confines of a family environment. Her chastity was merely one facet of her person, and thus only a condition of property rather than of person, and was not held sacred. 

“Jacobs illustrates her understanding of the cult of true womanhood’s standards but condemns those standards in their failure to truly protect a slave woman as they protect a white woman and that true womanhood is impossible for the slave woman to obtain, in the abolitionist North.” (Eagleton).Jacobs’ trials persist and she does not find the sanctity of home.

VII.      The Prevailing Quality of Home – Virtue in Adversity

Returning to Stowe for a moment and resuming with the above mentioned idea of reconstruction and household imagery, we examine another picture of home, this one from Uncle Tom’s Cabin. “Rachel Halliday's kitchen is the one room in the story where all is as it should be; Christianity reigns, black and white sit down to the table as equals, the white woman addresses the runaway slave as "daughter." It is enough, even, to soften the hardened heart of George Harris,” (Riedy).  Stowe’s romanticized idea of the ideal home is represented here; but so is the idea of racial equality as well as the essence of a broader definition of family – one of religious ties, rather than blood. 

Also vividly depicted is the idea that though the safety of home is not known to all, the home can be a beacon of light for those on a journey, and a sanctuary for the persecuted.   The home is a haven for and of virtue: a place where safety and morality can prevail regardless of the exterior climate. 

VIII.            Conclusion

It is certain that I encountered far more information in the research stages than could conceivably be organized for a query such as this.  I felt it important to lay a solid foundation of the understanding of the prevailing forces of the 19th century domestic landscape; however, more probing could go into the far reaching implications of slavery as an impact on home life.  In ascertaining the shifting trends of domestic emphasis to the outer sphere, it would also be beneficial to pay great attention to Margaret Fuller and the composition of the Feminist Manifesto. Ideas towards educating women were changing, and the social injustices that ignited women to act in the outer sphere would be doubtless a source of further inquiry in additional research.

There is a great amount to be gathered from the information already included in this project. The home and the family were already changing independent of the feminist movement, and the social activism evidenced in Romantic America. These were definite contributions to further the development, but dynamic shift of the home from the previous “Center of Industry” to a “Refuge from Industry” with the dawning of the Industrial Revolution was already underway, and this is of great importance.  At this time a prevailing domestic ideal had been established in America, and dubbed the “Cult of True Womanhood;” this social norm or goal placed great value on the home, motherhood, and domestic governance.  Upsetting to this ideal, was the condition of slavery.  As a result, African Americans were left adrift without the established cohesion of traditional family ties, as well as the enormous task of salvaging the broken families of slavery.  Before long this ideal of “True Womanhood” will also be challenged in its worth and permit a new landscape to eventually emerge for the American female and family.

In light of the coming abolitionism and feminist movement, the stage is set to witness the shift from the prevailing ideal of “True Womanhood” to a more current view on family, and to see a domestic America that more mirrors our own.

Certainly one could read these texts and commentaries, and being caught up in the spirit of the Romanic sentiments, or desire for a moment the warmth of the idealized, nostalgic hearth of American Renaissance literature.  However, these texts serve us today with a talking discourse of the formation of our present values, state, and culture.  We would do well to learn from the past, better understand our shifting ideals, and consider the end of our current course. 

While this has been a close look at the ideals of the home, and also a close reading of a couple of texts, the implications of the broader terms should not for a moment be discounted.  Our country is composed of states, composed of cities, of communities, of families, of individuals.  Though we do not always love to look on it, we, in our American individualism do each operate as a part of a greater whole; and therein resides a certain obligation. Through the study of the literary tread marks of our fathers and mothers gone before us, we can hope to gain better understanding of our past, be lead to fresh perspectives on our present course, and hopefully gain new insight into the paths that lie ahead to be seen.


Works Cited

Bryant, Alyssa N. “Changes in Attitudes Towards Women’s Roles: Predicting Gender Role Traditionalism Among College Students.” Sex Roles: A Journal of Research 48:3/4, (February 2003):131-133

Eagleton, Terry. “Written By Herself: Harriet Jacobs and the Failure of Ideologies.” Domestic Goddesses. Editor, Kim Wells. August 23, 1999. Online. Internet. Apr. 2003.
out site. <http://www.womenwriters.net/domesticgoddess/strickland.htm>.

Goode, William J. “Family Changes Over the Long Term: A Sociological Commentary.” Journal of Family History 28.1, (January 2003): 15-30

Jacobs, Harriet Ann. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Written by Herself: Electronic Edition. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Libraries: Documenting the American South.. 1998. Online. Internet. Apr. 2003

out site <http://docsouth.unc.edu/jacobs/jacobs.html>

Miller, James A. “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Historical and Literary Contexts.” Scribbling Women.  The Public Media Foundation. 2002. Online. Internet. Apr. 2003.

out site. <http://www.scribblingwomen.org>.

Riedy, Maureen E. “Uncle Tom’s America: Definitions.” Mothers in Uncle Tom’s Cabin. August 1997. Online. Internet. Apr 2003.

out site <http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA97/riedy/welcome.html>

 

Stowe, Harriet Beecher. “Correspondence: My Dear, Dear Georgiana.” Mothers in Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Editor, Maureen E. Riedy.  August 1997. Online. Internet. Apr 2003.

out site http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA97/riedy/georgna.html

 

Wolf, Amy.  “Virtue, Housekeeping, and Domestic Space in Pauline Hopkins’ Contending Forces.” Domestic Goddesses. Editor, Kim Wells. August 23, 1999. Online. Internet. Apr. 2003.
out site. http://www.womenwriters.net/domesticgoddess/strickland.htm.