History 305 examines how major American thinkers and intellectual movements of the "long nineteenth century" constructed an "exceptional" national identity by adjusting their culture's provincial Protestant and Enlightenment traditions to the challenges of transnational democratic, Romantic, and secular modes of thinking. Specific topics include Transcendentalism, evangelical and liberal Protestantism, pro- and anti- slavery arguments about "freedom," race and gender theory, philosophical idealism, literary realism, scientific Darwinism, and evolutionary social science. Effective Fall 2019, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Historical Consciousness, Ethical Reasoning, Critical Thinking.