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A Man Went Looking For America And Couldn't Find It Anywhere: The Wanderer In On The Road And Easy Rider, Taylor Camara

Cultural Studies Capstone Papers

This paper analyzes the archetype of the wanderer as a cultural phenomenon in 1960s America starting with Jack Kerouac's On the Road as an embodiment of the Beat Generation and ending with Dennis Hopper's Easy Rider (1969) as an embodiment of sixties counterculture. Through this progression, On the Road's projection of the wanderer is found within the hobohero as a dissident nomadic figure, and Easy Rider's as a cosmic cowboy- a countercultural twist on an American icon. By analyzing these figures, the contradictory nature between rebellion and tradition meet as hobo-hero and cosmic cowboy reject societal norms in the search …