transcendentalism

American  

[tran-sen-den-tl-iz-uhm, -suhn-] / ˌtræn sɛnˈdɛn tlˌɪz əm, -sən- /

noun

1. transcendental character, thought, or language.

2. Also called transcendental philosophy.  any philosophy based upon the doctrine that the principles of reality are to be discovered by the study of the processes of thought, or a philosophy emphasizing the intuitive and spiritual above the empirical: in the U.S., associated with Emerson.

---

transcendentalism British  

/ ˌtrænsɛnˈdɛntəˌlɪzəm /

noun

1. 1. any system of philosophy, esp that of Kant, holding that the key to knowledge of the nature of reality lies in the critical examination of the processes of reason on which depends the nature of experience

   2. any system of philosophy, esp that of Emerson, that emphasizes intuition as a means to knowledge or the importance of the search for the divine

2. vague philosophical speculation

3. the state of being transcendental

4. something, such as thought or language, that is transcendental

---

transcendentalism Cultural  

1. A movement in nineteenth-century American literature and thought. It called on people to view the objects in the world as small versions of the whole universe and to trust their individual intuitions. The two most noted American transcendentalists were Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.

---

Usage

What is transcendentalism? Transcendentalism was a philosophical and literary movement that arose in the United States in the 1800s. Transcendentalism emphasizes a person’s individual spirituality and the importance of nature and encourages a frugal lifestyle.Some of the major authors that were part of the transcendentalist movement include Ralph Walo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Margaret Fuller. The movement began in Concord, Massachusetts, during the 1830s. It became an official group after Emerson and three other Harvard University graduates formed the Transcendental Club in September 1836.The importance of individuality is a major belief of transcendentalism. The transcendentalists believed that human beings were born good, but society and institutions corrupted their souls. They argued that humans needed to return to nature and would become spiritually enlightened through an independent, frugal life lived in nature. This is argued in both Emerson’s Nature (1836) and Thoreau’s Walden (1854).The transcendentalists also held strong beliefs about many social causes. Emerson was unhappy with the treatment of Native Americans, Fuller was an outspoken feminist who anlayzed women’s role in society her 1845 book Woman in the Ninteenth Century, and Thoreau was vehemently opposed to slavery and strongly argued for peacefully protesting the government.Transcendentalism would slowly begin to fade in the 1850s after Fuller’s death in a shipwreck.

Other Word Forms

• transcendentalist noun

Etymology

Origin of transcendentalism

From the German word Transcendentalismus, dating back to 1795–1805. See transcendental, -ism

Example Sentences

And if it was easy to snicker at “Avatar’s” hippy-dippy sincerity, it was also easy to surrender to its multiplex transcendentalism, its world of synthetically crafted natural wonders.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 13, 2022

“They stand as an incarnation of transcendentalism at its most ebullient and its most fatuous,” Matteson writes.

From Slate • Jan. 10, 2020

With that too was all the a mixture between Tom Brown, primitive survival books and enormous amount of Emerson and transcendentalism and through the whole dial in the whole world.

From Salon • Mar. 9, 2019

George Steiner’s New Yorker review, titled Uneasy Rider, famously compared the book to Herman Melville’s sprawling masterpiece Moby-Dick; other reviewers mentioned Thoreau, whose American transcendentalism also sought to link everyday life and the metaphysical.

From The Guardian • Apr. 25, 2017

The Delphic Margaret Fuller, who was as truly the "blood of transcendentalism" as Emerson "was its brain," was here for months an honored guest.

From Literary Shrines The Haunts of Some Famous American Authors by Wolfe, Theodore F. (Theodore Frelinghuysen)