Chapter 7 Section 1

Cultural, Social and Religious Life

What makes a society unique?

• Scholarship• Art• Education

Education

• Noah Webster compiles the American Dictionary of the English Language

• Some states required free education for children

Benjamin Rush

• Doctor• Scientist • Revolutionary• Represented PA in

Continental Congress

Charles Wilson Peale

• Artist

Phillis Wheatley

• Young enslaved woman from Senegal

• Became a poet

Republican virtues

• Self reliance• Hard work• Frugality• Harmony• Sacrificing for the good

of the community

Why were Republican Virtues considered important?

• It was believed that Americans would need these in order to form the new Republic

Republican Woman

• One who had the virtues that would help her contribute to the success of the republic.

Social changes

• Population growth• Social mobility- people

were free to move place to place

What factors drove population growth in the early 1800s?

• A great increase in the number of births

Religious Renewal

• Second Great Awakening- Powerful religious movement from the early 1800s– Evangelical in nature

Evangelical

• The Bible is the final authority

• Salvation is achieved only through personal belief in Jesus Christ

• People demonstrate beliefs by living a “transformed lifestyle”

Congregation

• Members of the church– Focus was on the

congregation rather than the ministers• SGA was very democratic

because of this

Revival

• Common feature of SGA• Gathering where people

were “revived” or brought back to a religious life– Listening to preachers– Accepting Jesus

New Denominations

• Religious subgroups• Experienced rapid

growth during SGA

• Baptists, Methodists, Unitarians, Mormons, etc…

How did the Second Great Awakening lead to the growth of new Christian denominations?

• Baptist churches grew because they reflected the evangelical zeal of the 2nd Great Awakening

• Methodism was well suited to frontier life and appealed to common people

• Unitarianism offered hope and appealed to reason

• The Mormon faith also gained followers due to the simplicity of its doctrine

Mercy Otis Warren

• Was Mercy Otis warren a good example of a “republican woman”? Why or why not?