I find the Fourierest Phalanxes very interesting because the plan was so well detailed even up to the exact amount of members that should be admitted. Fourier’s original ideas were well thought out and focused a lot on a special “divine social code” that Fourier claimed to have mastered to create a harmonious community. His focus on such a socially cognizant community seems intriguing because Fourier didn’t focus too much on the specific laws of the society.

When Brisbane brought the ideas to America, he altered it to fit American culture and it seemed to work fairly well on Brook Farm. What I found to be interesting was the introduction of the media by Horace Greely for the movement that brought a lot of attention to the community to the insiders and outsiders. It helped defend its critics and grew to establish a Propagandist newspaper, the Harbinger which was a new idea in the midst of a growing journalistic world. I want to explore the impact of these publications on the inside and the outside of the community. Looking at journalism at the time both from the Harbinger and from news sources outside would be a way to explore this further.

How did the rise of the interest in journalism at the time impact the success of the publications dedicated to Brook Farm and the Associationist movement?