Literature in English, North America Commons^™

Educating And Debating Social And Political Issues In The Naperville Lyceum, Carl Fletcher, Stephen Perry, Cristi Eschler-Freudenrich, Jonathan Powers, Flora Khoo, Brooke Dunbar-Treadwell, Beryl Nyamwange, Hanisha Besant, Jana Duckett

English Faculty Scholarship

This historical research responds to a call from other scholars to allow the
topics discussed in the lyceum of the nineteenth century to shed light on
the social consciousness of the frontier settlements of the era. The recent
discovery of the “Proceedings of the Naperville Lyceum” (1836-1843)
provided the means to do this. Since political topics were clearly central to
the Naperville Lyceum members, this research focused on those items. It
is revealing that lyceum topics in this location were not self-absorbed. The
debated topics included several global issues and did not simply
champion the American status quo. It suggests …