Unit 4: Topic 6 - Market Revolution: Society and Culture Flashcards
What two immigrant groups were the largest immigrant groups coming to the United States between 1800 and 1848?
Irish and German immigrants.
Irish immigrants were the largest immigrant group to the United States, largely due to a potato famine in Ireland in the 1840s. They were very often targets of xenophobic discrimination and religious persecution, with most Irish immigrants being Catholic.
Germans were the second largest group of immigrants to the United States after the Irish. They came to the United States seeking political and religious freedom and greater economic opportunities than could be found in Europe.
What event explains the large number of Irish immigrants coming to the United States in the 1840s?
The Great Irish Famine, or just the potato famine.
The famine resulted from a five-year blight in the 1840s that turned potato crops black. Between 1845 and 1850, one million Irish died of starvation, and another two million fled the country.
The number of Irish immigrants in the United States grew from 235,000 in the 1830s to 845,000 in the 1840s.
Which six states were created during the period of 1815 to 1821?
Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Mississippi, Alabama, and Maine.
The first five states were created due to larger numbers of Americans moving west of the Appalachian mountains, which had served as a geographic divide to the territory of the United States. Maine was created as part of the Missouri Compromise, having formerly been part of Massachusetts.
Describe the concept of Manifest Destiny.
Manifest Destiny was the idea that it was a god-given right of Americans to spread out over the North American continent, to the detriment of the people already inhabiting it.
Between 1790 and 1840, 4.5 million people crossed westward over the Appalachian mountains. Americans also moved southward to Florida after the United States purchased it from Spain in 1819.
How did the Market Revolution affect economic classes within the United States?
The Market Revolution enabled goods to travel farther as transportation costs decreased.
- Working poor: A growing population began in cities where overcrowding and poor sanitation became common problems.
- Emerging middle class: Profited from these economic changes while benefiting from the ability to buy products that were previously unavailable.
- Wealthy business owners: Expanded their wealth as their business empires grew.
These changes would increase dramatically in the second half of the 1800s as the Second Industrial Revolution began.
Explain how wage-based jobs differed from earlier models of manufacturing jobs.
Before the growth of factories in the United States, manufacturers set their own prices and engaged in a barter economy. However, with wages in factories, the amount of money a factory worker made was fixed by their bosses. This meant that the workers were no longer in charge of themselves, challenging more traditional ideas of freedom.
Describe the cult of domesticity.
The cult of domesticity was the philosophy that women retained power by controlling the household.
This philosophy led to less hiring and lower wages for women working in factories since it was assumed that they would not be the only ones in the family earning a wage. Many middle-class women were restricted to the domestic sphere.
Who was Catharine Beecher?
Catharine Beecher was an early feminist who suggested that women have a unique role in education as the moral compasses of the family.
Women came to lead the teaching profession, a power that they leveraged to gain public attention in the first women’s rights movement.
Who were the Lowell girls?
The Lowell girls were women working in the Lowell Mills in Massachusetts, founded by Francis Cabot Lowell.
Lowell’s company, the Boston Manufacturing Company, preferred the labor of individual workers rather than families. Younger white women were often hired since they had fewer other economic opportunities available and had more experience working with textiles.
Define temperance.
Temperance was a movement to prevent or reduce the consumption of alcohol in the United States.
Temperance was a movement largely led by women who suffered from their husbands’ alcoholic tendencies. Temperance was a major component of the broader women’s rights movement.
