Asking American citizens about their notion of the American frontier, you will receive very similar answers most of the time. Basically, Americans link the American frontier with the “Wild West”; an image that includes cowboys wearing hats and being equipped with weapons as it was reflected in various Western movies or entertainment shows in the last few years. However, it is worth mentioning at this point that a lot of Americans today also consider other aspects of the American frontier, such as what the frontier historically speaking actually was: It refers to the unexplored areas of the United States that were settled from approximately 1600 to 1890, beginning in the east towards the west including violent treatment of Native Americans, the original inhabitants. The American frontier served as an important factor in forming fundamental American values, namely “individualism”, “self-reliance”, “equality of opportunity”, “hard work” and “can-do spirit” (Kearny Datesman et al., 2005), but it also had a negative impact, that is familiarity with the use of weapons.
The Impact of the American Frontier
Asking American citizens about their notion of the American frontier, you will receive very similar answers most of the time. Basically, Americans link the American frontier with the “Wild West”; an image that includes cowboys wearing hats and being equipped with weapons as it was reflected in various Western movies or entertainment shows in the last few years. However, it is worth mentioning at this point that a lot of Americans today also consider other aspects of the American frontier, such as what the frontier historically speaking actually was: It refers to the unexplored areas of the United States that were settled from approximately 1600 to 1890, beginning in the east towards the west including violent treatment of Native Americans, the original inhabitants. The American frontier served as an important factor in forming fundamental American values, namely “individualism”, “selfreliance”, “equality of opportunity”, “hard work” and “can-do spirit” (Kearny Datesman et al., 2005), but it also had a negative impact, that is familiarity with the use of weapons.
The first value that has its origin in the American frontier is individualism, which is of a high importance in present America. To start with, individualism could be seen in frontier life inasmuch as the individual was not limited by many restricting laws or rules in contrast to other communities. Consequently, every individual had a high amount of personal freedom concerning all aspects of their life. This is exactly the idea which people have hold in high regard ever since for its simple and “uncivilized” image of life, in which the individual could lead their life with nearly no consideration for others. As a result, many inhabitants of Western countries still hold the view that, to guarantee their utter freedom, the government should not interfere in their lives. To sum up, the notion of the “free individual” (Kearny Datesman et al., 2005) living at the frontier influenced the American value individualism, especially in former frontier states in the Western part of the USA.
Individualism is closely related to self-reliance: as there was no ruling government, the individual had to decide and make everything by themselves, such as finding food and building houses. The typical American image of an independent individual living at the frontier is the image of a strong and experienced man who had already lived a hard life at the frontier. It has to be mentioned at this point that there were actually two types of men at the frontier: the first type were explorers who had to struggle with nature by discovering the unsettled land, such as Daniel Boone who was highly regarded as a winner over the wilderness, as he had remained alive in it for two years and had even been caught by Native Americans at that time. When speaking of the first type, it is mainly referred to frontierspeople before the 1860’s, in other words before the Civil War. In contrast, the period from the 1860’s to approximately 1890 was mainly characterized by fights between men during the Civil War. Accordingly, the other variety of frontiersmen were basically fighters who fought against others over the control of the explored land. These men were seen as heroes as reflected in typical Western movies. At the same time, the image of the “Wild West” came into existence. Today, many Americans still stick to self-reliance, since they are of the opinion that you should do everything yourself without the help of others as long as your abilities allow it. All in all, the self-reliant men living at the frontier had a strong impact on the present American “do it yourself spirit”.
Another value that originated in the American frontier is equality of opportunity, conveying that everybody was seen as equal and had the same rights with regard to sex, age, and social position. A common saying of people living at the frontier was: “What’s above the ground is more important than what’s beneath the ground.” (Kearny Datesman et al., 2005). This quotation reflects clearly that the past was not regarded as important; the present was what counted instead. Furthermore, it goes to show their view of life, expressing that life is what you make of it, no matter who your family is and which social group they belong to. Consequently, the frontier provided a chance for those Americans willing to start anew or improving their position in life. Although there was the chance of upward mobility, people were treated as equals without minding their social status. Compared to today, it can be said that many Americans estimate equality of opportunity highly inasmuch as believing in social mobility, according to the amount of work that you do. To conclude, equality of opportunity is a highly esteemed value in America today that resulted from the American frontier.
Closely related to equality of opportunity is the American value “hard work” which also originated from frontier life. First of all, as all people were seen as equal, everybody was willing to work hard to earn a good living because they were all convinced of the real chance to succeed. Secondly, people at the frontier had to work hard because nearly nothing existed when they arrived there. It was essential to build places to sleep as well as to live and there was no other possibility than doing it by yourself through hard work. Moreover, people were working efficiently when cities were built and later on further enlarged. Another example of hard work can be found in the gold and silver rush when people were trying hard to gain as much as possible out of it. Present America has a similar notion of hard work and conveys the belief that you can achieve everything if you work hard enough. All in all, hard work is an essential American value that can be definitely linked to hard work at the frontier.
The fifth value that is a result of the American frontier is a “can-do spirit” (Kearny Datesman et al., 2005) manifested by many Americans. The main idea of this is that all problems can be solved and that nothing is impossible. The foundation stone of this spirit can be found at the frontier again, as people invented the things they needed for work. Frontier people were regarded as more creative in inventing new items than people living in other parts of the United States. They did not have a government or society to rely on and so they had to be inventive to survive. It influenced present American thinking, since many Americans have the same optimistic attitude that all problems can be dealt with easily. In sum, the “can-do spirit” (Kearny Datesman et al., 2005) of the frontierspeole was transferred into present America where it seems to have become established.
Despite all the positive values that America gained from the life at the frontier, it also had a negative impact on American society that is familiarity with the use of weapons. The image of the “Wild West” includes cowboys equipped with weapons, which are part of their everyday life. Most of the time Western movies reflect exactly this notion and include, in addition to this, violent and bloody fights, in which many characters get finally killed. As far as justice is concerned, these movie characters are self-reliant and take charge of justice, or what they think it to be, themselves. The idea of physical male power derived from the “Western macho hero” (Kearny Datesman et al., 2005) also influenced the characters of other movies or video games. Many Americans grew up with the notion that weapons are part of everyday life and must be present in a household for self-protection. However, there are very conflicting opinions in America about this issue, since many people have been questioning the presence of weapons in everyday life after several massacres in American schools. They are convinced that weapons have a negative influence on the youth who perceive weapons in several movies or at home, and claim that weapons should not be so easily accessible for everyone. In sum, Western movies idealizing frontier people using their guns caused a loose handling of weapons in America today.
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- Quote paper
- Anonymous,, 2009, The Impact of the American Frontier, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/1360400
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