DOI
https://doi.org/10.25772/VS72-W280
Defense Date
2021
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts
Department
History
First Advisor
Dr. Carolyn Eastman
Second Advisor
Dr. Brooke Newman
Third Advisor
Dr. Adam Ewing
Abstract
This thesis explores American exceptionalism through the lens of American newspapers during the Revolutionary era. As American newspapers covered the revolutions in France, Haiti, and Latin America, unique narratives developed around controversial leaders like Thomas Paine, Toussaint Louverture, and Simón Bolívar. Although at first newspapers covered the events in France and Latin America with glee, their coverage gradually began to change over time, increasingly finding flaws large and small in revolutions other than their own—chaos and violence in France and Haiti, and failures in the realization of republicanism in Latin America. If Americans initially believed their revolution was responsible for the Revolutionary era, newspapers increasingly touted the success of the American Revolution and the failures of other revolutions. A feeling of superiority began to develop in the United States regarding its own revolution, which created a powerful sense of American exceptionalism. American newspapers, this thesis shows, sought to downplay the success of subsequent movements by casting doubt on the success of the movements overall. Over the course of the Revolutionary era, American newspapers reinforced American patriotic values by creating narratives that justified a sense of American superiority based on a contrast of the American Revolution with the other revolutions in the Atlantic world during the early republic.
Rights
© Benjamin R. Smith
Is Part Of
VCU University Archives
Is Part Of
VCU Theses and Dissertations
Date of Submission
5-14-2021
Included in
African History Commons, African Languages and Societies Commons, Cultural History Commons, Latin American History Commons, United States History Commons