Frontier Thesis - Citizendia

Frederick Jackson Turner, author of the Frontier Thesis

The Frontier Thesis or Turner Thesis is the conclusion of Frederick Jackson Turner that the wellsprings of American exceptionalism and vitality have always been the American frontier, the region between urbanized, civilized society and the untamed wilderness. For other people of this same name see Frederick Jackson and Frederick Turner Frederick Jackson Turner ( November 14, 1861 American exceptionalism (cf " Exceptionalism " refers to the belief that the United States differs qualitatively from other Developed nations A frontier is a Political and Geographical term referring to areas near or beyond a boundary, or of a different nature Urbanizationn (also spelled urbanisation) is the physical growth of Urban areas into rural or natural land as a result of population in-migration to an existing A Civilization is a society in which large numbers of people share a variety of common elements In the thesis, the frontier created freedom, constantly named as civilization, "breaking the bonds of custom, offering new experiences, [and] calling out new institutions and activities. " Turner first announced his thesis in a paper entitled "The Significance of the Frontier in American History," delivered to the American Historical Association in 1893 at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. " The Significance of the Frontier in American History " is a seminal essay by the American Historian Frederick Jackson Turner which advanced the The American Historical Association ( AHA) is the oldest and largest society of Historians and Teachers of History in the United States Year 1893 ( MDCCCXCIII) was a Common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common The World's Columbian Exposition (also called The Chicago World's Fair) a World's Fair, was held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary Chicago (ʃɪˈkɑːgoʊ is the largest City by population in the state of Illinois and the American Midwest of the United States.

Turner set up an evolutionary model (he had studied evolution with a leading geologist), using the time dimension of American history, and the geographical space of the land that became the United States. The first settlers who arrived on the east coast in the 17th century acted and thought like Europeans. They encountered environmental challenges that were different from those they had known in Europe. Most important was the presence of uncultivated arable land (though large tracts were in use as Indian hunting grounds. ) They adapted to the new environment in certain ways — the cumulative effect of these adaptations was Americanization. According to Turner, the forging of the unique and rugged American identity had to occur precisely at the juncture between the civilization of settlement and the savagery of wilderness. The dynamic of these oppositional conditions engendered a process by which citizens were made, citizens with the power to tame the wild and upon whom the wild had conferred strength and individuality.

Successive generations moved further inland, shifting the lines of settlement and wilderness, but preserving the essential tension between the two. European characteristics fell by the wayside and the old country's institutions (e. g. established churches, established aristocracies, intrusive government, and class-based land distribution) were increasingly out of place. Every generation moved further west and became more American, more democratic, and as intolerant of hierarchy as they were removed from it. They became more violent, more individualistic, more distrustful of authority, less artistic, less scientific, and more dependent on ad-hoc organizations they formed themselves. In broad terms, the further west, the more American the community.

Turner's thesis quickly became popular among intellectuals. It explained why the American people and American government were so different from Europeans. It sounded an alarming note about the future, since the U.S. Census of 1890 had officially stated that the American frontier had broken up. The idea that the source of America's power and uniqueness was gone was a distressing concept. Many, including historian Theodore Roosevelt, who later became president, believed that the end of the frontier represented the beginning of a new stage in American life and that the United States must expand overseas. Theodore Roosevelt (ˈroʊzəvɛlt October 27 1858 January 6 1919 also known as T United States overseas expansion follows the expansion of US frontiers on the North American continent (see Mexican-American War, War of 1812, and Territorial For this reason, some see the Turner thesis as the impetus for a new wave in the history of United States imperialism. American Empire is a term referring to the political economic military and cultural influence of the United States. However, Turner's work, in contrast to Roosevelt's work The Winning of the West, places greater emphasis on the development of American republicanism than on territorial conquest and the subjugation of the Native Americans. Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples from the regions of North America now encompassed by the continental United States

Ironically, the Great Plains began losing population during Turner's lifetime, and have continued to do so for the last 80 years. The Great Plains are the broad expanse of Prairie and Steppe which lie east of the Rocky Mountains in the United States and Canada Several hundred thousand square miles now have less than 6 persons per square mile — the density standard Turner used to declare the frontier "closed". Large areas have less than 2 persons per square mile. The number of counties below this "frontier density" increased by 14 between 1980 and 2000. In fact, today Kansas has more "frontier" counties (using Turner's definition) than it did in 1900, and 35 of the 53 counties in North Dakota qualify as "frontier". Kansas ( is a Midwestern state in the central region of the United States of America, an area often referred to as the American " North Dakota ( is a state located in the Midwestern and Western regions of the United States of America. [1]

The Canadian political thinker Charles Blattberg has developed an interesting contrast between the American frontier process as described by Turner and the notion that, in Canada, settlement is best described as having involved the moving of a "border" from east to west. Charles Blattberg is a professor of political philosophy at the Université de Montréal. According to Blattberg, a border assumes a significantly sharper contrast between the civilized and the uncivilized since unlike with a frontier process the civilizing force is not supposed to be shaped by that which it is civilizing. Blattberg criticizes both the frontier and border "civilizing" processes.

See also

Further reading: Scholarly studies