Sedgwick's Argumentative Essay

Essentially, America needed to keep the permeating cultures of other western nations at bay while it could create its own culture—separate from that of British culture. While America could not completely remove its ties from Europe, it was important for the nation to see if what it did borrow was compatible with the nation. And the sentiment of being opposed to the encroachment of other cultures is not something that was alone to Sedgwick’s writing. This is something that only sixteen years later, Susan Warner similarly warns about in her own essay on what women can best do to serve their country. “[These] mad copyers of European ways can make no distinctions; all is fish that comes to their net, as we say, provided only that it be caught in foreign waters. If a thing be French, or English, or German—it is enough! No matter whether it be in itself excellent, or adapted to our institutions, our customs, or our circumstances; that is never thought of” (319). While America could not separate itself from its European history, it did need to prove itself as independent on the national cultural stage. “[Using foreign customs] does lessen both the individual and his country in the eyes of
The cultural positions between America and the rest of the Western nations have completely switched. Rather than being in a position where America could become overrun by other Western cultures, the other Western cultures are in a position where they must fear being overrun by American culture. Coming from a period of incredible vulnerability after its emergence into a postcolonial state, authors like Sedgwick that promoted the idea for a truly independent and distinct American culture, and led the way for America to come into the cultural dominance that it enjoys