The Myth of the American West

Basics of the Myth(s)

Land of Opportunity Rugged Individualism Innocence Fate and Destiny Re-invention of identity “Safety valve” Adventure, romance, violence, triumphalism Agrarian Myth/Garden of Eden

The Basics, continued Benevolent expansion “The Frontier” Wild nature and Indians Progress & improvement of land Icons: cowboy, Indian, gunslinger, lawman, covered wagon, log cabin,

mountain man, “settlers,” farmer

Paintings and Engravings

Frontier Prototype (1823-1840s)

James Fennimore Cooper

Last of the Mohicans The Deerslayer The Pioneer The Prairie

Natty Bumppo: romantic frontier hero of the wild. Half savage-civilized. Individualist, strong, true

…continued

Davy Crockett & Daniel Boone

Immortalized with folk-tales and stories

Pop culture hero Wishes and dreams of

imperial expansion Frontiersman

19th Century Artists

George Catlin Karl Bodmer Albert Bierstadt Frederic Remington Charles Russell Thomas Moran

Shaped public ideas of the west, lands, people

Idealized, stereotypes,

Catlin, “Buffalo Hunt, Chase”

Catlin, “Indians attacking Grizzly”

Alfred Jacob Miller, 1840s

Thomas Moran

George Bingham, 1852, “Daniel Boone Escorting Settlers Through the Cumberland Gap”

C.M. Russell

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Industrial Nostalgia “Modern” technological,

mechanical, corporate, urban, scientific, secular, professional

Something “lost” in America Longing, missing the imagined

past How to maintain rugged

individualism while working for corporate America

Land and democracy vs. urban America and interdependency

Rescuing the Masculine Frontier

Theodore Roosevelt -Easterner turned Westerner -“The Strenuous Life” -The Winning of the West -Expansionist -Philippines, Cuba, etc Rugged male individualism

in age of industrialization “Cowboy President”

Gunfighter, early 1910s Troopers on the Trail

Western Dime Novels Max Brand Clarence Mulford Zane Grey Louis L’Amour Larry McMurtry Tony Hillerman

Recycling storylines for mass production

Early Movies: “Westerns”Edwin Porter (1903) Great Train Robbery had hold-ups,

villains, shoot-outs, bad-good guys, adventure Cecil B. DeMille (1913) Squaw Man The Gunfighter (1917) James Cruze (1923) The Covered Wagon

Teaching immigrants about American history Mass production, low culture, consumer culture Entertainment is not historical accuracy Standard stories about American greatness,

progress, exceptionalism, simplification

Television: The 1950s & 1960s Constructing a modern

American “hero” Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Little

House on the Prairie, Lone Ranger, Maverick

Cold War America (good vs. bad)

“Consensus” on American traditions & identity

Unanimity = patriotism Diversity & skepticism =

subversion

The Western (America’s Original Literature) Ingredients

Lassos, Colt 45’s, long-horned steers, rugged landscape with mountains in the distance, stagecoaches, Stetson Hats

Outlaws, lawmen, gunfighters, indians, ranchers, farmers

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Elements of The Western Conquest of the wilderness Confiscation of territorial rights over original

inhabitants Society organized around codes of honor

rather than rationalistic, abstract law No larger social order than immediate peers

and family

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The Western Hero Cowboy or Outlaw

A “knight” of the frontier Semi-nomadic wanderer Fighting villains or a changing society that would

infringe upon his personal freedom is bound to no social norms other than his own

personal code of honor

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The Western Hero The traditional Western takes these elements

and creates a simple morality tale where the hero survives and endures through toughness and not compromising his code of honor More recent westerns will reveal a landscape that

is morally ambiguous where the hero fights against a changing world

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The Western Hero Often stress the harshness of the wilderness Settings will frequently include

isolated forts ranches and homesteads The Native American village The small frontier town with a saloon, store, and

jailhouse

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Bonanza Gunsmoke

Comic Books

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Consuming the West

George Bush, The Cowboy President

-Reinvention of identity to fit Western Iconography

-Connecticut Family-Wealth enabled him to avoid

Vietnam-Father was career politician

in “big government”-Yale “educated”-Failed oil and business man

Cowboy hat, boots Wanted: Dead or Alive “Bring ‘em On” “Shoot from the hip” Chopping Wood Crawford Ranch Ford Pickup Truck