individualism — Bunk History

Alexis de Tocqueville.

American Nightmares

Wang Huning and Alexis de Tocqueville’s dark vision of the future.

by Tanner Greer via Scholar's Stage on March 28, 2024

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Glad to the Brink of Fear

A new biography reveals how Ralph Waldo Emerson gave Americans a vocabulary to understand themselves in an era even more tempestuous than our own.

by Nicole Penn via American Purpose on March 13, 2024

Painting of "The County Election" by George Caleb Bingham.

The Myth of American Individualism

How the utopian notion of the U.S. as a meritocracy became so ingrained in the American psyche.

by Eric C. Miller, Alex Zakaras via Arc: Religion, Politics, Et Cetera on February 21, 2023

Mark Wallinger's "Self-Portrait," a painting showing black dripping paint in the silhouette of an unfurled scroll on a grey background

The Illusion of the First Person

The personal essay is the purest expression of the lie that individual subjectivity exists prior to the social formations that gave rise to it.

by Merve Emre via New York Review of Books on October 11, 2022

Collage of nature images and transcendentalists' faces, with flowers in Emerson's eyes.

Emerson and Thoreau’s Fanatical Freedom

Why do the Transcendentalists still have an outsize influence on American culture?

by Sarah Blackwood via The New Republic on January 6, 2022

Henry David Thoreau

Thoreau: A Radical for All Seasons

The surprising persistence of Henry David Thoreau.

by Jedediah Britton-Purdy via The Nation on June 1, 2017

A drawing of human eyes behind a variety of consumer goods, including milk, shoes, and toothpaste.

The Surprising History of the Ideology of Choice

How endless options became our only option.

by Andrew Lanham via The New Republic on April 11, 2025

An illustration of a government building holding up an American home with a stylized hand.

The Good Society Department

Once upon a time, there was a federal government department that helped design and distribute tools for living the good life. What happened to that vision?

by John Last via Noema on April 3, 2025

A man in a suit with angel wings clipped to his back, tipping a hat with six different arms.

The Cult of the Entrepreneur

Why do Americans idealize people who found businesses?

by Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein via The New Republic on February 17, 2025

Photograph of Benito Mussolini

Gold and Brown

Libertarianism, fascism, and democracy.

by John Ganz via Unpopular Front on February 10, 2025

A drawing of a man riding a train and laying down train tracks in front of him.

The Insidious Charms of the Entrepreneurial Work Ethic

You’re passionate. Purpose-driven. Dreaming big, working hard, making it happen. And now they’ve got you where they want you.

by Anna Wiener via The New Yorker on January 27, 2025

Zora Neale Hurston.

Why Zora Neale Hurston Was Obsessed with the Jews

Her long-unpublished novel was the culmination of a years-long fascination. What does it reveal about her fraught views on civil rights?

by Louis Menand via The New Yorker on January 13, 2025

Meme of white Gen X voters in their ironic cynicism.

We Care a Lot: White Gen Xers and Political Nihilism

Since the 2024 election, liberals, progressives, and the left has been wringing our collective hands over why Trump won yet again.

by Mindy Clegg via 3 Quarks Daily on December 20, 2024

Kamala Harris

The Democrats’ “Opportunity” Pitch Is a Dead End

The meritocratic pitch was emblematic of Democrats’ long march away from working-class voters.

by Lily Geismer via Jacobin on December 11, 2024

An old, crumbling Victorian house with figures from horror, including Toni Collette in Hereditary, a zombie, Edgar Allen Poe, and Stephen King.

American Horror Stories

It just might be the great American art form. You can thank the residents of Salem for that.

by Laura J. Miller via Slate on October 19, 2024

Ralph Waldo Emerson Meets His Spirit Animal

Some Americans who have lost faith in traditional institutions are finding spirituality in this Denver church—and in themselves.

by Molly Worthen via Arc: Religion, Politics, Et Cetera on September 19, 2024

Lyndon B. Johnson and Lady Bird Johnson visit the Fletcher family in Inez, Kentucky, in 1964.

Who’s to Blame for White Poverty?

Dismantling it requires getting the story right.

by Elizabeth Catte via Boston Review on September 5, 2024

A political cartoon of Charles Guiteau holding a pistol and a sign that reads "An Office or Your Life."

Why Are Presidential Assassins Such Sad Sacks?

What would-be killers of the US commander in chief have in common is that they aren’t fervent ideologues; they’re outcasts.

by Zack Budryk via The Nation on July 22, 2024

Nora Kenworthy's book: "Crowded Out: The True Costs of Crowdfunding Healthcare".

Crowded Out: The Dark Side Of Crowdfunding Healthcare And Its Historical Precedents

The moral terrain of crowdfunding is fueled by two persistent social ideologies: the dual, and intertwined, myths of meritocracy and the “deserving poor.”

by Nora Kenworthy via HistPhil on July 12, 2024

Herbert Hoover breaking ground on a model home in front of a crowd.

Home Sweet Home

On the early years of the real estate industry, and the racist effort to convince white Americans to buy single-family homes.

by Adrienne Brown via HNN on June 20, 2024

Elon Musk's face edited onto Apple advertisements.

A Bullshit Genius

On Walter Isaacson’s biographical project.

by Oscar Schwartz via The Drift on March 12, 2024

A man stands before four doorways with cryptic letters on them.

Sorting the Self

The self has never been more securely an object of classification than it is today.

by Christopher Yates via The Hedgehog Review on March 3, 2024

Virginia Kraft holding a hunting rifle, sitting on a dead elephant.

Sports Illustrated's Forgotten Pioneer

In the Mad Men era of magazine journalism, Virginia Kraft was a globe-trotting writer and a deadly shot with a rifle. Why hasn't anyone heard of her?

by Emily Sohn via Long Lead on January 14, 2024

The Electric Kool-Aid Conservative

Tom Wolfe was no radical.

by Osita Nwanevu via The New Republic on January 5, 2024

Black and white photo of two African American men standing in front of March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom sign.

The Obamas’ “Rustin”: Fun Tricks You Can Do on the Past

The project of “reclamation and celebration” proceeds from an impulse to rediscover black Greats who by force of their own will make “change.”

by Adolph Reed, Jr. via Nonsite on December 16, 2023

A drawing of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

Did Meriwether Lewis Die by Suicide? The Answer Still Matters.

Lacking a sufficient support system, Meriwether Lewis did not have anyone close enough to help him.

by Jamie M. Bolker via Made By History on December 1, 2023

A portrait of Andrew Jackson.

Whiggism Is Still Wrong

Vivek Ramaswamy says he wants to "make hard work cool again." He isn’t the first.

by Sohrab Ahmari via The American Conservative on November 21, 2023

Painting Romania Unchained.

Where Identity Politics Actually Comes From

Nationalism, not postmodernism, is the fount of today's politics of recognition.

by Jason Blakely via The Chronicle of Higher Education on October 3, 2023

Cover of "The Corporation in the Nineteenth-Century American Imagination" featuring a dragon with its tentacles entrapping people.

Between The Many and The One

Stephanie Mueller´s book sheds light on the percieved death of liberalism and the fear of corporations.

by Kevin Musgrave via The New Rambler on September 29, 2023

A man and a dog walk among blighted buildings in the Bronx.

The Persistence of American Poverty

“We could afford to end poverty,” Matthew Desmond tells us. That we don’t is a choice.

by Marcia Chatelain via The Nation on August 21, 2023

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