Annenberg Foundation
Annenberg Learner: American Passages: Spirit of Nationalism: Margaret Fuller
Margaret Fuller is featured for her writings during the transcendentalist movement of the nineteenth century, considered progressive for her times as women of the era were not taught to think. Click "Margaret Fuller Activities" for...
Constitutional Rights Foundation
Constitutional Rights Foundation: The Transcendentalists in Action
Activity on the religious, philosophical and literary movement of Transcendentalism founded by Ralph Waldo Emerson. Article outlines the history and main ideas as well as the far-reaching literary and societal impact of Transcendentalist...
Georgia Department of Education
Ga Virtual Learning: American Literature: Transcendentalism: Walt Whitman
This lesson from a unit on American Transcendentalism focuses on Walt Whitman and his invention of the American free verse. It includes links to his poems "Song of Myself" and "When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer." It provides...
Library of Congress
Loc: Today in History: July 12: Henry David Thoreau
From the Library of Congress "Today in History," this website provides biographical information about Henry David Thoreau along with photographs of Thoreau and Walden Pond. Provides links to online text for Thoreau's work, links to...
Library of Congress
Loc: Today in History: November 29: Bronson Alcott & Father
From the Library of Congress "Today in History" website, this page provides biographical details about Louisa May Alcott and her family. The second section discusses her father, Bronson Alcott, and gives details about his ideas, the...
OpenStax
Open Stax: An Awakening of Religion and Individualism
This section of a chapter on "Antebellum Idealism and Reform Impulses" explains the connection between Evangelical Protestantism and the Second Great Awakening and describes the message of the transcendentalists.
Library of Congress
Loc: Summer on the Lakes E Text
Here is a short biography and a analysis of "Summer on the Lakes" by Margaret Fuller. It also contains links to the online text for this essay describing her trip to the Great Lakes in 1843. Text can be viewed on a page-by-page basis in...
Other
America Dept. Of State: Outline of American Literature [Pdf]
This online book presents an overview of American literature chronologically. Eras and movements are explained and biographies of significant authors are provided. This is a good way to understand the background and influences of...
Washington State University
Washington State University: Literary Movements
This Washington State University site provides a wonderful source for all the literary movements that have taken place in American Literature from 1620-1920. Click on the movement (listed on the left)you are interested in (Naturalism,...
Department of Defense
Do Dea: Contemplation and Argumentation
In this self-guided unit, you will read Romantic and Transcendental literature and you will practice the art of persuasion using rhetorical devices, appeals, and refutation while avoiding logical fallacies. By the end of the unit, you...
Eserver
E Server: The Thoreau Reader: Annotated Works of Henry David Thoreau
This website provides an introduction to and the the text of some of Thoreau's most famous works.
Bartleby
Bartleby.com: Cambridge History of Eng and Am Lit: Transcendentalism
This site provides details about the contributions of Bronson Alcott to transcendental thought and explains his role in Fruitlands and Brook Farm. Explains his innovative educational theories and provides details about his family life.
PBS
Pbs Learning Media: Louisa May Alcott: Transcendentalism
Explore the impact of transcendentalism on the life of Louisa May Alcott and American society in this video [4:00] from the American Masters film Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind 'Little Women.' Emphasizing self-reliance, civil...
PBS
Pbs Learning Media: American Masters Collection: Louisa May Alcott
This is a collection of two video lessons about Louisa May Alcott and her works especially "Little Women."
PBS
Pbs Learning Media: Walt Whitman: Journalist and Poet
Through an examination of primary sources and watching a short video, students will learn about Whitman's love for and criticism of the United States.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Reading Guide: Henry David Thoreau, "Walden"
Thoreau offers in this excerpt from Walden the Transcendentalist observation that each human must search for religious meaning within himself and not as a quest to glorify God.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Triumph of Nationalism: America, 1815 1850: Religion
A collection of nine primary resources including historical documents, literary texts, visual images, and maps illuminated and contextualized by notes, thematic questions, and text-specific discussion questions for classroom instruction...
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: William Cullen Bryant and Philip Freneau
Two poems examining divinity and concluding that while God is benevolent, one appreciates God either through a romantic lens or a rationalist calculation. Poems are William Cullen Bryant's, "To a Waterfowl," and Philip Freneau's, "On the...
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Religion: Henry David Thoreau
The National Humanities Center presents collections of primary resources compatible with the Common Core State Standards - historical documents, literary texts, and works of art - thematically organized with notes and discussion...
Cengage Learning
Houghton Mifflin: Emerson's Major Themes
Houghton Mifflin site has an entry that discusses major themes, historical issues, writing style, audience, and literary criticism for Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882). Contains discussion/study questions and a bibliography.
University of Groningen
American History: Essays: Philosophy and Literature: Two Philosophies
Explains what the 'Scottish philosophy' was and how well it fitted with American sensibilities in the 1800s. Over time it evolved into the American philosophy of Pragmatism. The other philosophy that took hold in some groups of society...
Virginia Commonwealth University
Virginia Commonwealth University: Transcendentalism: Ideas and Thought
This resource provides information about American Transcendentalism, and biographies of people who followed this philosophy.
Texas A&M University
American Transcendentalism Web: Henry David Thoreau
Resource provides a biographical look at the Transcendentalist writer, Henry David Thoreau, as well as links to further biographical information, major Thoreau sites, Thoreau texts, and even a criticism of his work "Walden," in audio...
University of Michigan
American Verse Project: Early Poems of Ralph Waldo Emerson
Read and search for thirty poems by Ralph Waldo Emerson, taken from the book "Early Poems." Includes a brief biography of Emerson.