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The Rise of the Market: Individuation and Integration in Antebellum America

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Nineteenth-Century Individualism and the Market Economy

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Abstract

This chapter offers an account of the contemporaneous rise of individualism and an integrated market economy in antebellum America. Drawing upon social, economic, cultural, and political history, it sketches a pattern of individuation at work in American society during the first half of the nineteenth century. The era was marked by an individualistic spirit manifest in nearly every aspect of life, from dress and religion to voluntary associations and economic practices. By the dawn of the Civil War, the so-called market revolution had accelerated the transformation of America into a nation of striving individuals, with individualism fueling the expansion of the market, and market practices training persons to act as individuals.

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  1. Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA

    Luke Philip Plotica

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Plotica, L. (2018). The Rise of the Market: Individuation and Integration in Antebellum America. In: Nineteenth-Century Individualism and the Market Economy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62172-2_2

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