AMERICAN CULTURE ON AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE

American Culture on American Architecture

American Culture on American Architecture

The Beginning

The America that existed after the end of the Civil War is nothing like we know it as today. Major urbanization and industrialization, equal rights for all citizens, and two major world wars have shaped how we understand it. While there are countless numbers of events that have shaped the country since the end of slavery in the United States, there are a few that stand as markers of great change, including the period of Reconstruction, massive industrialization, Worlds Wars I and II, the Great Depression, and the Civil Rights movement.

Development

One of the first major events in America after the Civil War was the period of Reconstruction, which lasted from about 1865 until 1876. This was a period of great upheaval and the nation attempted to reorganize itself and integrate the Southern states that now had to become part of the Union. In addition, freed slaves from all over the South now found themselves without a system that had once controlled nearly every aspect of their lives and they had to find a way to integrate into a society that was still, for the most part, heavily biased against them. There was little political or social agreement during the Reconstruction period, particularly over issues such as who should be permitted vote (ex-slaves, Confederates, those slaves who served in the war) as well as how the South was going to rebuild itself after the vast destruction of many of its centers and its loss of slave labor. With the death of Abraham Lincoln and takeover by Andrew Johnson, the process of Reconstruction was made more complex for blacks in the south. Legislative acts known as the black codes came into effect which greatly hindered the attempts of freed slaves to start a new life. This is also something of a “breaking point” between two entirely different Americas. By the end of Reconstruction, industrialization was only beginning to take hold outside of the Eastern states such as New York and much of the country was still rooted in times gone by.



References

Marsden, George M. 1990. Religion and American Culture. Orlando: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, pp.45-46.

Jefferson, Thomas (1904). The writings of Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association of the United States. pp. 119.

Abraham, J. H. 1977. The Origins and Growth of Sociology. New York: Penguin.

Acland, Charles R. , ed. and ...