Abstract:
The rapid development of nineteenth-century cities in northeastern America led to a revision in the way many Americans, particularly middle and upper class men, viewed themselves and one another. Emphasis on competition in the work space led to an increase in what twentieth-century psychologists recognize as dissociative relation, a component of relational framing theory. Through an analysis of characters in the works of Edgar Allan Poe and Herman Melville, my thesis explores the transposition of dissociative patterns from the factory setting to the city streets.
