Running head: HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

Historical Topic Review:

Boston Conversations/Margaret Fuller Ossoli
Krista M. Boddy
Colorado State University

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

Abstract
The following historical topic review investigates the impact of Margaret Fuller Ossoli and her
Boston Conversations. Margaret Fuller is best known as a feminist pioneer in the field of
womens education. She is also one of the leaders of early adult educational pedagogy, which
allowed learners to lead conversations, rather than the instructor. This was a new way of
managing a classroom, which spawned from the Transcendentalist thought of the era. Fullers
Boston Conversations, which lasted for five years, exemplified the new pedagogy, which
incorporated participation, rather than passivity, and was meant to cultivate the female mind
through engaging discussion. This historic period was a starting point in the field of adult and
womens education in American society, which would not be what it is today without Fullers
insight and passion. See Appendix A for class activity (Jeopardy game) and discussion of topic.
Keywords: Margaret Fuller, Feminism, Adult Pedagogy, Transcendentalism, Boston
Conversations

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

Margaret Fuller Ossoli
(Sarah) Margaret Fuller (1810-1850) was born in Cambridgeport, Massachusetts to a
family which valued education. Her father, Timothy Fuller, was a prominent lawyer and later a
Congressman. He encouraged Margarets learning of Greek, Latin, German, and Italian. The
death of her father left her family with financial problems, especially the cost of educating her
younger siblings. At age 25, Margaret took on this financial obligation by becoming a teacher at
Bronson Alcotts Temple School and the Green Street School (American Transcendentalism
Web). She paid for three brothers to attend Harvard (Margaret Fuller Bicentennial Website).

Margaret Fuller is best known for her Boston Conversations, which she led from 18391844. Various female intellectuals from the Boston area were invited to meet weekly and discuss
topics which ranged from women, to education, and womens roles in society. Fullers
Transcendentalist philosophy became the current through which her conversations were led. She
assisted Emerson as an editor and writer for a literary and philosophical journal called The Dial.
Margaret Fuller is known also for her promotion of womens equality and became a passionate
feminist writer (American Transcendentalism Web).

Other accomplishments of Margaret Fuller include being the first American to write a
book about equality for women, being the first editor of The Dial, a Transcendentalist journal led
by Ralph Waldo Emerson, being the first woman to enter Harvard Library for research, being the
first woman journalist on the New York Daily Tribune, being the first female literary critic, and
being the first female foreign and war correspondent to serve during wartime (Margaret Fuller
Bicentennial Website).

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

After moving to Italy and marrying an Italian revolutionary, Marchese Giovanni Angelo
dOssoli, Margaret drowned, along with her husband and son, in route to the U.S. in 1850 when
her ship ran aground in a storm off the New York coast (American Transcendentalism Web).

American Transcendentalism
American Transcendentalism was a philosophical and literature movement that grew out
of the early to mid-nineteenth century (1836-1860). Beginning as a reform movement within the
Unitarian church, Transcendentalism became a search for an indwelling God and the
significance of intuitive thought (Campbell, 2013). Transcendentalists believed that the soul of
each individual is identical with the soul of the world and contains what the world contains
(Campbell, 2013). In Charles Mayo Elliss, An Essay on Transcendentalism (1842), he explains,
"That belief we term Transcendentalism which maintains that man has ideas, that come not
through the five senses or the powers of reasoning; but are either the result of direct revelation
from God, his immediate inspiration, or his immanent presence in the spiritual world. . . ."
(Campbell, 2013). William Channing (1810-1844), who was a proponent of the movement
explains further:
Transcendentalism, as viewed by its disciples, was a pilgrimage from the
idolatrous world of creeds and rituals to the temple of the Living God in the soul.
It was a putting to silence of tradition and formulas, that the Sacred Oracle might
be heard through intuitions of the single-eyed and pure-hearted. Amidst
materialists, zealots, and skeptics, the Transcendentalist believed in perpetual
inspiration, the miraculous power of will, and a birthright to universal good. He
sought to hold communion face to face with the unnamable Spirit of his spirit, and

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

gave himself up to the embrace of nature's perfect joy, as a babe seeks the breast
of a mother (Campbell, 2013).
Margaret Fullers Boston Conversations
Margaret Fuller facilitated a series of weekly conversations with female intellectuals
which took place from 1839-1844. The participants were usually 20-25 women who met for a
two hour period in Elizabeth Peabodys future bookstore in Boston (Simmons, 1994, p. 195).
Many of the participants were women married or related to men who were associated with social
reform movements. Some of these included the wives of the leading Transcendentalists and
important abolitionist leaders of that time (Capper, 1987, p. 511). Most of these women
participants shared high educational backgrounds, multilingualism, comprehensive knowledge of
classical and modern literature, religious liberalism or Unitarianism, and Transcendentalism
(Capper, 1987, p. 511).
As a Transcendentalist, Fuller became a cultural reformer ahead of her time (Capper,
1987, p. 509). Her romantic educational philosophy guided her in her emphasis on learning as
private and practical and social only in a very spiritual sense, it was both hardheaded and
experimental-minded, demanding and curiously complacent (Capper, 1987, p. 515).
Margaret Fuller was primarily concerned with women's intellectual and spiritual
character. Fullers intent was not to create a social club, rather she desired to educate her
students, essentially by changing their way of thinking. She hoped to answer the questions:
What were we born to do? How shall we do it? which so few ever propose to themselves 'till
their best years are gone by. (Capper, 1987, p. 513-514).

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

Her pedagogy incorporated participation, rather than passivity, and was meant to
cultivate the female intellect through discussion of topics such as "the intellectual differences
between men & women" (Conversation 17, Simmons, 1994, p. 196). A typical session would
involve Fuller bringing up a topic for the days discussion and asking questions of participants.
She explained her role as facilitator, rather than teacher, she would be one among, not over,
the class in their mutual exploration of the topics she proposed (Simmons, 1994, p. 200). One
of her students wrote, Miss Fuller guarded against the idea that she was to teach anything. She
merely meant to be the nucleus of conversation - She had had some experience in conducting
such a conversation, - & she proposed to be one to give her own best thoughts on any subject that
was named, as a means of calling out the thoughts of others (Simmons, 1994, p. 203). As a
facilitator, Fuller explained in her introductory lecture that she was "not here to teach" but "to
provoke the thought of others" in order, to encourage the kind of intellectual reproduction and
self-activity inside a classroom men were able to experience outside of one (Capper, 1987, p.
515). Many observers attested to her skill in throwing the ball of conversation back and forth
and encouraging her participants (Capper, 1987, p. 516).
Other topics of these conversations included "education", "woman" and expanding a
woman's "sphere". The purpose of these conversations were meant to encourage her female
students to think for themselves, for women were capable of intellectual improvement, &
therefore designed by God for it- Margaret Fuller (Simmons, 1994, p. 203). She often asked
her students for written statements of their thoughts, as well as definitions of concepts like
faith or beauty. She once told her audience that we know words, and have vague
impressions, but no real ideas (Capper, 1987, p. 516).

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

One of the most famous statements by Margaret Fuller during one of the conversations
involved the reproduction of knowledge between men and women. She questions:
Is not the difference between [2-3 words lost] education of women & that of men
this - Men are called on from a very early period to reproduce all that they learn First their college exercises - their political duties - the exercises of professional
study - the very first action of life in any direction - calls upon them for
reproduction of what they have learnt. - This is what is most neglected in the
education of women-they learn without any attempt to reproduce - The little
reproduction to which they are called seems mainly for the purposes of idle
display (Simmons, 1994, p. 203).
Transcendental feminist writer, Ednah Littlehale Cheney, who attended three successive
years of the conversations when she was in her early twenties, had the following impression of
the effect of the conversations.
I found myself in a new world of thought; a flood of light irradiated all that I had
seen in nature, observed in life, or read in books. Whatever she spoke of revealed
a hidden meaning, and everything seemed to be put into true relation. Perhaps I
could best express it by saying that I was no longer the limitation of myself, but I
felt the whole wealth of the universe was open to me (Capper, 1987, p. 519-520).
The effects of Margaret Fullers Boston Conversations on adult education, and womens
education, are innumerable. Her influence on early feminist thought and educational pedagogy
can be seen in modern classrooms today. Current adult pedagogy includes active engagement,

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

cooperative learning, group discussion, and provocation of thought in others. This historic
review is relevant in current adult pedagogy and equality in the education of women.

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

References
American Transcendentalism Web (n.d.). Retrieved from http://transcendentalismlegacy.tamu.edu/authors/fuller/
Campbell, D. M. (2013). American Transcendentalism. Literary Moments. Dept. of English,
Washington State University. Retrieved from
http://public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/amtrans.htm
Capper, C. (1987). Margaret Fuller as cultural reformer: The conversations in Boston. American
Quarterly, 39(4), 509-528. DOI: 10.2307/2713122. Retrieved from
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2713122
Margaret Fuller Bicentennial Website (2015). Retrieved from http://www.margaretfuller.org/
Simmons, N. C. (1994). Margaret Fullers Boston Conversations: The 1839-1840 Series. Studies
in the American Renaissance, 195-226. Retrieved from
http://www.jstor.org/stable/30227655

HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

Appendix A
Class Activity (Jeopardy Game) and Topic Discussion
Divide class into three or four groups. On whiteboard, draw following grid for points.

Margaret Fuller

100

200

300

400

American
Transcendentalism

100

200

300

400

Boston
Conversations

100

200

300

400

Questions (and answers) by category:

Margaret Fuller:
100: How long did Margaret Fuller live? 40 years
200: Who did Margaret Fuller marry? Marchese Giovanni Angelo dOssoli
300: How did Margaret Fuller die? Shipwreck
400: What was the name of the literary/philosophical journal Fuller edited? The Dial
American Transcendentalism:
100: Which church did American Transcendentalism form out of? Unitarian
200: When was American Transcendentalism most prominent? (1836-1860)
300: Which are the two major subjects behind Transcendentalism? Literature and Philosophy
400: True/False: Transcendentalists believed in the power of reasoning and the five senses
(False)
Boston Conversations:
100: When did the Boston Conversations take place? (1839-1844)
200: How many participants typically met during these sessions? (20-25)
300: What was Margaret Fullers primary concern or purpose in creating the Boston
Conversations? Womens intellectual and spiritual character/women to think for themselves
400: What kind of pedagogy did Fuller use in leading the Boston Conversations?

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HISTORICAL TOPIC REVIEW: BOSTON CONVERSATIONS

Participatory, facilitator (not teacher), not here to teach but promote thought in others,
constructivism

Final Question (500 extra points): How does this historical topic apply to us as
facilitators/teachers/trainers?
Constructivism: Rather than constructing the knowledge for others, the
students/learners/participants should construct their own knowledge from experience, problem
solving, relevance, and intelligent effort.

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