Honors Theses
Date of Award
2012
Document Type
Undergraduate Thesis
Department
History
First Advisor
John Neff
Relational Format
Dissertation/Thesis
Abstract
This thesis is a comparative study of the rise of sectionalism in northern and southern antebellum American institutions of higher education. The West Point Military Academy, which maintained a roughly equal number of southern and northern cadets. presents a case-study of how faculty, staff, and students dealt with sectionalism in a mixed group. Information was gathered from numerous sources including college histories, archival material from the University of Mississippi, and southern military school studies. Several general trends were discovered from this data. 1) Southern academia actively encouraged the development of sectionalism because it provided public funding and enrollment for southern college establishment. 2) Southern educators did not originally intend to encourage secessionist sentiment; however, their conception of southern sectional identity under attack gradually radicalized southern academic and students. 3) Northern students were generally indifferent to southern sectionalism, slavery, and the prospect of war; however, following the Battle of Fort Sumter, they were inspired to enlist. 4) Sectionalism was very present at West Point though it was forced underground by faculty and staff concerned with preserving the nationalizing influence of the military academy on cadets.
Recommended Citation
Gauthier, Patricia Grace Ethel, "A Higher Duty:' The Sectionalization of American Institutions of Higher Education" (2012). Honors Theses. 2331.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis/2331
Accessibility Status
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