Blog Post #2

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How did this research help me come to my final research question? Reflect on the ways the workshop shaped your topic and refined your research question?

My curiosity about the “Americanization of Fourierism” actually manifested while I read the originally background source about Brook Farm by Carl J Guarneri. Initially, I saw this American adaptation as a method of calculated deception as American Fourierists like Albert Brisbane adjusted the theory to be more appealing to the average nineteenth century American. But as I read another article by Guarneri, one that is especially dedicated to the American adaptation of Fourierism and utopia in general, I gained a new perspective about the approach used by the utopian socialists. To adequately understand the development of American Fourierism, I had to  analyze multiple primary sources. First, I read Charles Fourier’s piece describing his vision of a true phalanx and then compared this source to “Association” by Albert Brisbane, which is essentially the preliminary establishment of American Fourierism. I also read Horace Greeley’s letters and “The Harbinger,” paying close attention to the vocabulary and rhetoric used in these sources to persuade the American people. I realized that instead of simply asking how Brisbane and others Americanized Fourierism, I should focus on the circumstances of this modification and the resulting implications?

How did the Americanization of Fourierism inhibit the success of the phalanxes such as Brook Farm and ultimately undermine the movement?