Transcendentalism as a Literary Movement

This Course is ascribed to the literature module that is destined to second year students of Amar Telidji university. It aims as shedding light on an important movement that features the American literature which is Transcendentalism. With the dawn of the 19th century, America embraced some philosophical views and movements that refreshed people’s ways of thinking. Among these movements is transcendentalism. This latter   is characterized by certain traits and features that make it agreeable as far as the principles of the American society are concerned. This movement emerged  from the Biblical criticism of Johann Gottfried Herder and Friedrich Schleiermacher, the skepticism of David Hume and the transcendental philosophy of Immanuel Kant and German Idealism. By the end of this course students are expected to have a clear idea about the gist of this movement, the conditions that led to its emergence and its reflections in the American literature. Students  are also  expected to be able to differentiate between the transcendental movement and its former : “Romanticism”.