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Venturing More Than Others Have Dared: Representations of Class Mobility, Gender, and Alternative Communities in American Literature, 1840-1940

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Venturing More Than Others Have Dared: Representations of Class Mobility, Gender, and Alternative Communities in American Literature, 1840-1940 Venturing More Than Others Have Dared: Representations of Class Mobility, Gender, and Alternative Communities in American Literature, 1840-1940 DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Heather Joy Thompson-Gillis, MA Graduate Program in English The Ohio State University 2012 Dissertation Committee: Susan S. Williams, Advisor Jared Gardner Andreá Williams Copyright by Heather Joy Thompson-Gillis 2012 Abstract In the nineteenth century, alternative communities composed of men and women outside of the traditional biological family began to form not only in the many utopian projects inspired by the transcendentalist movement, but also in factories, settlement houses, and on the road. These alternative communities, which I define as social constructions apart from the middle class home, were often composed of individuals from different socioeconomic class positions and disrupted traditional ideas about gender and labor. Ultimately, they proved the difficulty of defining socioeconomic class in American culture. In this dissertation, “Venturing More Than Others Have Dared: Class Mobility, Gender, and Alternative Communities in American Literature 1840-1940,” I argue that the literature written about these alternative communities shows them to be liminal spaces of attempted social mobility where socioeconomic class and gender roles are constantly redefined in a way that challenge social norms. I specifically analyze literature emerging from the Fruitlands utopian community, the Lowell factory system, the Hull-House settlement house, and female hobo narratives. Communities outside middle class culture are especially important to analyze because of the ways they illuminate tensions in defining social positions in American society. While I am concerned with the representation of the role of women in these alternative communities, my dissertation primarily seeks to trouble the elision of socioeconomic class studies in nineteenth-century literary criticism. In this work, I use conversations about gender to ii provide insight into issues of labor and tensions in defining socioeconomic class in accounts of these alternative communities. The literature emerging from these communities, including journal entries, short stories, newspaper articles, folk tales, and novels, provides insight into the constant struggle to find an empowering identity for workers, and women workers in particular. As unrest over socioeconomic disparity continues to be a driving force in American culture, it is more important than ever to understand representations of socioeconomic class in our past and the ways that alternative communities have used literature to envision a more just society. iii This document is dedicated to the women of Franklinton, Ohio. iv Acknowledgments This project was completed with the support of many communities. I would like to thank my dissertation committee, Jared Gardner, Andreá Williams, and especially my advisor Susan S. Williams, for their help in completing this document. They consistently offered me encouragement and invaluable advice throughout the drafting process. I am profoundly grateful to Susan Williams for sharing her high academic standards and for understanding and encouraging my personal connection to this work. My writing group, Karin Hooks, Anne-Marie Schuler, Annette Dolph, and Leila Ben-Nasr also offered instrumental feedback and motivation. Their thought-provoking scholarship drove me to produce my best writing. The Coca-Cola Critical Difference for Women grant provided necessary research funds during a pivot moment in the drafting process. I would not have been able to complete this project without the emotional support and unwavering encouragement of my family, especially my parents, Melanie and Dennis. Melanie Kopacsi’s dedication to social service and Dennis Thompson’s love for the academy are sustaining. Though he did not live to see the completion of this dissertation, my stepfather, Richard Kopacsi’s, faith and dedication to hard work still inspire me. Sharon Gillis, Jim Gillis, Shane Thompson, Jen Graham, Adam Graham, Melissa Graham, and Paige Graham all provided welcome distractions from my work. My own v alternative community in Franklinton shared their wisdom and ideas as I considered issues of socioeconomic class privilege and mobility. Kelly Young, Ashley Laughlin, and Patience Livermore inspire me daily with their love for women, poetry, and community. Brian Gillis has devotedly shared each step of my academic progression, from helping me move to my first college dorm room to taking over more than his fair share of household chores as I revised this work. I hope this dissertation reflects the energy and joy I find in all of these communities. vi Vita 2001................................................................Westerville South High School 2005………………………………………….B.A. English and Women’s Studies, Denison University 2007................................................................M.A. English, Miami University 2007 to present ..............................................Graduate Teaching Associate, Department of English, The Ohio State University Fields of Study Major Field: English Graduate Minor: Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies vii Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................... ii Dedication .......................................................................................................................... iv Acknowledgments............................................................................................................... v Vita .................................................................................................................................. vvii Introduction………………………………………………………………………………1 Chapter 1: Alcott’s Alternative Families in “Transcendental Wild Oats, Under the Lilacs and Jack and Jill ………………………………………………………………………..20 Chapter 2: Rethinking the Industrial Utopia: Factory Work and Class Mobility……….74 Chapter 3: Literature and Community Formation at Hull-House………………………129 Chapter 4: The Hobo New Woman and Communities on the Road……………………178 Coda: (Luck Is) Beauty with Torture…………………………………………………...233 Bibliography .................................................................. 24Error! Bookmark not defined. viii Introduction “To insure a more natural union between intellectual and manual labor than now exists; to combine the thinker and the worker, as far as possible, in the same individual; to guarantee the highest mental freedom, by providing all with labor adapted to their tasks and talents, and securing to them the fruits of their industry; to do away with the necessity of menial service by opening the benefits of education and the profits of labor to all; and thus to prepare a society of liberal, intelligent, and cultivated persons, whose relating with each other would permit a more wholesome and simple life than can be led amidst the pressures of our competitive institutions.” –George Ripley’s goals for Brook Farm “To dancing in a circle of love. To living in beloved community.” –bell hooks, Epigraph to Belonging: A Culture of Place (2009) In 1841, George Ripley established Brook Farm, the most famous American utopian community, with the goal of creating “a society of liberal, intelligent and cultivated persons, whose relation with each other would permit a more wholesome and simple life than can be led amidst the pressures of our competitive institutes” (qtd. in Swift 7). Utopian communities of the mid-nineteenth century were concerned with forming self-sufficient societies that balanced manual and intellectual labor. Unfortunately, many community members soon realized that the manual labor necessary to maintain their vision did not allow time to relate their experiences in print, leaving a dearth of literary representations of these experiments. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Blithedale Romance (1852) was inspired by his time at Brook Farm and is one of the few novels exploring utopian communities. Though the text shows how the community is eventually destroyed by individual goals and desires, Hawthorne’s preface suggests that important lessons can be learned from these social experiments. He states, “the author 1 cannot close his reference to this subject, without expressing a most earnest wish that some one of the many cultivated and philosophic minds, which took an interest in that enterprise, might now give the world its history.... both the outward narrative and the inner truth and spirit of the whole affair, together with the lessons which those years of thought and toil must have elaborated” (3). Hawthorne’s distinction between the “outward narrative” and “inner truth” suggests the possible difference between the goals of the communities and the actual results. Ripley’s and Hawthorne’s use of the word “cultivated” is also significant. Though they appear to use it to mean refined or cultured, it also refers to land tilled and prepared for raising crops. The dual meaning of this word alludes to the tension in defining and valuing different forms of labor in these communities. Though Ripley hoped to create a community that respected both manual and intellectual labor equally, it proved to be a difficult task. In the preface to The Blithedale Romance, Hawthorne also reflects on the process of drawing on his experiences
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