“A Peculiar National Character”: Transatlantic Realignment and the Birth of American Cultural Nationalism after 1815

Abstract

This article argues that the emergence of American cultural nationalism after the War of 1812 developed in self-confident opposition to the Old World, yet was thoroughly influenced by European standards of nationhood. American intellectuals who campaigned for cultural independence from Europe at the same time retained European standards of civilization and esthetics, and were thoroughly influenced by ideas about the relationship between culture and nation that developed in England and Germany. This articles discusses these postcolonial complexities are reflected in debates about American cultural identity in newly founded magazines such as the North American Review that long predated Emerson’s famous “Intellectual Declaration of Independence” of 1837.