American Literature: Romanticism research assignment Student Research Submissions 2013 conference proposal / abstract

Meryl Bazaman

University of Houston–Clear Lake

Humanities Graduate Student

Paper/Panel for Coastal Plains Graduate Conference on Language and Literature

Access to Projector and Computer for PowerPoint* 

Emerson’s Internal Revolution

Subtitle: Emerson’s Intuition as Rebellion against Globalization and Pedagogical Facebook Possibilities

Abstract

Ralph Waldo Emerson writes in Self-Reliance, “Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members.” Yet, if society decays and corrodes the validity of manhood, how does an individual reclaim and reassert his or her personhood? I propose that Emerson responds to this social dehumanization where “the machine unmans the user” with intuitive revolution. Emerson encourages individuals to draw upon their “Intuition” or “primary wisdom,” which actively allows each individual to have unmitigated access to “the essence of genius, of virtue, and of life.” Through his intuitive revolt against a world inhabited by “the intruding rabble of men and books and institutions,” Emerson protests the depersonalizing consequences of the globalization of his day. Emerson’s intuition challenges the message that people are all an indistinguishable, sensing mass that passively react to daily stimuli. Emerson’s revolutionary intuition asserts that every individual being is an active agent of his or her own destiny by virtue of their own, irreplaceable and distinctive Intuition.

Furthermore, the influence and implications of Emerson’s intuitive revolt are still felt in modern day pedagogy. How would Emerson view Facebook? How could Emerson employ this agent of “disruptive media” into his intuitive selfhood, educational framework? While further research is necessary to fully answer these questions, I also propose that synthesizing Emerson’s perceptions of intuition with academic journal findings on Facebook can provide questions that assist readers in reevaluating Facebook’s simultaneous threads of individuality and globalization. 

Finally, this paper can function as an individual paper or panel presentation addressing “Internal Revolutions –within characters or authors.” It can also be adapted into a PowerPoint presentation or delivered in lecture format.