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| White Americans are prejudiced against American Indians, even though we are the ones who continue to dispossess them of the lands, attack their villages, and force them to relocate. Our treatment of American Indians is unfair yet most white Americans fail to recognize this. By instilling Victorian values in them, American Indians can be assimilated into mainstream society. |
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| Through telling his story Chief Joseph tries to prove that American stereotypes of Indian/tribal life are incorrect. He compares white and Indian conceptions of land ownership, leadership, negotiation, and ethics, and implies that in many ways the Indians live up to the philosophy they preach more than whites do. (Ex: whites claim to practice equality, then they kick Indians off of their land). Ultimate goal is convincing whites to act as Indians do so that “we shall have no more wars.” |
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| The frontier represents American individualism and democracy and is the line of most rapid and effective Americanization which gradually moves across the country. The frontier decreased our dependence on England and allowed us to create our own world out of undeveloped wilderness. Reaching the last frontier is the end of the first chapter of America’s history. |
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| Women must be held to the same standard of self-sufficiency as men are because life is a solitary experience and every individual needs to be capable of managing him/herself. Because both genders need to be able to fall back on their own resources, men should not dispossess women of their rights or try to control them. |
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| Women have evolved to be increasingly dependent on men so that their main purpose in society is reproductive. Women’s only potential for economic profit comes through sex-attraction. Instead, women need to move out of the home to participate in creative intellectual society. This will help her rekindle her independence that has been lost. The Yellow Wallpaper provides example of what happens when woman get left at home for too long (insanity), but in writing the Yellow Wallpaper Gilman herself is asserting her own independence and ascent into intellectual society. |
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| The Populist Party Platform of 1892 |
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| Explicit demands of Populist party advocating rights for “the plain people” in the midst of an America that only caters to “tramps and millionaires.” Among these demands are unions, national currency (silver, not gold), public ownership of crucial services (telephone, telegraph, railroads), graduated income tax,and eight hour work day, and others. |
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| The leisure class puts a drain on society instead of contributing to it, and their weight on society is demonstrated by the needless consumption and leisure that members of high society try to make conspicuous. Acquisition of material goods, leisure activities, and educational credentials represent some of many meaningless experiences that the wealthy engage in, and these pursuits are not helping to further society at all (rather, they detract from it). |
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Divided by different articles:
-we all have a right to adopt a believing attitude, even while our rationality, or our intellects, aren’t completely convinced. (The Will to Believe)
-Ethics are contingent on the metaphysical and religious beliefs of the individual, and thus the are individual constructs that cannot be universalized. (Moral Philosopher)
-It is difficult to recognize another consciousness in the same way that we recognize ourselves (On A Certain Blindness)
--People of all ideals and ranks can live a significant life as long as they identify ideals that they want to promote and work towards. (What makes Life Significant)
- Robert Gould Shaw was an emblem of American brotherhood, courage, and morality and he and others like him deserve recognition (through art, culture) for their actions so that other Americans learn about them and follow their noble example. (Robert Gould Shaw) |
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