Social Reform In Edward Bellamy's Looking Backward

The novel Looking Backward, written by Edward Bellamy, is about a young man, Julian West, who gets put into a hypnotic sleep in the late nineteenth century but awakens in the twenty-first century. In 2000, the year that West woke up in, the society had significantly changed from 1857 and Bellamy addresses the changes throughout the novel. Bellamy essentially created a utopian society extremely different from the society that he was in. Woman had equal rights as men. Social class did not exist. Everybody

Throughout the 1890’s to the 1920’s the Progressive Era was a period of social activism and political reform in the United States. It was also a period of explosive economic growth, fueled by increasing industrial production, a rapid rise in population, and the continued expansion of the consumer market place. The main objective of the progressive movement was illuminating the presence of corruption in government (Foner, 2017). During the 1880’s there were two very influential works published during

better life is possible in the here and now” (Sargent 8). This being said, the following novels incorporate this belief into specific Utopian ideals and structures: Sir Thomas More’s Utopia, Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Herland, and Looking Backward: 2000-1887 by Edward Bellamy. Each of these works develop nonconformist concepts of the work and job selection of a Utopian civilization, the practiced religious and superstitious views, as well as the overarching governmental structures within the authors’

The definition of freedom depends entirely on how the phrase “freedom from…” ends. Perhaps a most straightforward understanding of freedom is the laissez-faire emphasis on limiting the power of government to interfere in economic and social matters. In this state of absolute freedom, however, inequalities exist between people, so that freedom from a controlling government does not imply individuals’ freedom of contract, movement, legal protection, equal rights through citizenship, or political

Meanwhile, West, who suffers from insomnia, had secretly built an underground fire-proof and sound proof sleeping chamber. He employed a skilled mesmerist to send him into a deep sleep when needed. West only allowed his mesmerist and servant to know of this chamber. One night after being put to sleep, West’s entire home was burnt to the ground. Though West was protected, because no one knew of his chamber, Julian was assumed dead by his fiancé, friends, and family. Over one hundred years later,

It is difficult to point out that religion, though very significant, was an issue accounted for among each of these novels. Because of the societal corruption within the author’s realities, they were given the opportunity to recreate the religions, the beliefs, and values their utopians strove for. Sargent states that many Utopian communities “have been religious and they tried to lead a way of life that their members believed their faith required”(Sargent 35). Utopia offers its readers a sense of

was flourishing; it was coasting on new inventions and ideas like the cotton gin, steam engine and manifest destiny. However, through this all, the balance of social and economical order was being weighed in favor of the wealthy and powerful. All American societies dating way back to the very first at Jamestown and Plymouth, have had social stratifications. As the population has grown in America, and the capacity for industry and wealth increased, the stratification has only become more staggering

Kimberly Hollman HIS356K March 3, 2016 The Many Faces of Social Darwinism Hollman 1 of 5 The second half of the 19th century was a time of great flux in the United States. The impact of the Civil War perturbed all spheres of American domestic life, leaving its citizens in a state of anxiety regarding their beliefs, government, and even their fellow man. These changes happened concurrently with advances in the sciences: on the eve of the Civil War, Charles Darwin published his influential On the