American Enlightenment
Jeff P, Trevor O, Ryan H, Haruka K, Noa L
Definition
The "new-model" American style colleges of King's College New York , and the College of Philadelphia were founded. Other colleges like Yale College and the College of William & Mary were also formed and reformed. Puritan colleges like the College of New Jersey and Harvard reformed their studies to include natural philosophy, modern astronomy, and math.
The foremost representatives of the American Enlightenment included men who were presidents of colleges, Jonathan Edwards, Thomas Clap, and Ezra Stiles, and moral philosophers Samuel Johnson and William Smith. The leading Enlightenment political thinkers were John Adams, James Madison, James Wilson, and Alexander Hamilton, and polymaths Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.
Famous Indivisuals:
John Locke
Benjamin Franklin
(1706-1790) One of the American Founding Fathers of the United States. He was a very versatile man being an author, politician, diplomat, scientist and statesman. He was a key figure in the American enlightenment, which saw major breakthroughs in science and ideas of political republicanism. Benjamin Franklin was a supporter of colonial unity and the United States.
Thomas Jefferson
How the time period connects to the literature:
- American Enlightenment came while America was still a British colony. (1714-1818)
- The Age of Enlightenment is the time period in which cultural and social changes occurred emphasizing reason, analysis and individualism rather than traditional ways of thinking.
- Enlightenment thinkers had begun to question previously accepted truths about who should hold the power in government.
- As products of the Enlightenment, however, revolutionary writers focused their energies on matters of government rather than religion.
Works Cited
"Enlightenment." History.com. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2014.
"Famous People of the Enlightenment -." Biography Online. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Dec. 2014.
"The Enlightenment in America." The Enlightenment in America. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2014.