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Events
Jun. 30 | 2012 Bode-Pearson Prize
Nominations for the 2012 Bode-Pearson Prize for Outstanding Contributions to American Studies due
Jun. 30 | 2012 Mary C. Turpie Prize
Nominations for the 2012 Mary C. Turpie Prize for Outstanding Contributions to American Studies Teaching, Advising, and Program Development due
Oct. 1 | Travel Grants for Graduate Students
For submission guidelines, click here
Resources: Abstracts of American Studies Dissertations
By University | By Year
Sawin, Mark H. Meltzer. "Raising Kane: The Creation and Consequences of Fame in Antebellum America, or, The Thrilling and Tragic Narrative of Elisha Kent Kane and his Transformation into Dr. Kane, the Hero of the Romantic Age," American Studies, University of Texas at Austin, April 2001.
This dissertation illustrates how Elisha Kent Kane, a sickly Philadelphia physician, transformed himself into the nationally celebrated Arctic explorer, “Dr. Kane.” With a constant eye toward the public, Kane, his family, and his publisher, George W. Childs, constructed the perfect words for Dr. Kane’s books, look for Dr. Kane’s image, and stories for Dr. Kane’s biography. They also hid the less-than-perfect aspects of his life-most importantly his engagement to “spirit-rapper” Margaret Fox. Their efforts were enormously successful and by the mid-1850’s Dr. Kane was one of the most famous men in America; he was the subject of plays, songs, poetry, and panorama shows and the celebrated author of Artic Explorations, a book that sold 145,000 copies by the end of the decade. But fame proved a Faustian bargain. After making himself a hero, Kane was horrified to discover that he was a slave to the image he had created. In 1857, at the height of his fame and misery, he died. Unencumbered by Elisha’s human faults and desires, his celebrated alter ego, “Dr. Kane” became the perfect American hero. Embraced by North and South, men and women, science and religion, Dr. Kane became the common hero of a diverse and divided nation. The narrative of Kane’s life and fame is thus emblematic of antebellum American society. He lived and came to symbolize their hopes and fears. As Civil War soldiers noted a few bloody years after his death, he was “the last hero of the United States of America.”
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