Amusing The Million Analysis

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Amusing the Million by John F. Kasson uses Coney Island as a turning point in American history before World War I. Coney Island at the rise of a new mass culture during the twentieth century allowed society to be free from the ever so conformity that the government has bestowed upon them. Being free from the urban industrialized genteel control; the creation of Coney Island served a purpose to detach from the formal culture in which they were living in. This era has sparked cultural freedom with that gave society a thrilling new find in amusement parks which went against societal genteel norms. Coney Island was used as an escape from the industrialized life that wanted to establish civil order. Kasson explains the turn of the century that encompassed educators, critics, and genteel reformers who took charge in controlling the public. With the creation of museums, art galleries, libraries, symphonies founded by genteel reformers; they wanted to institutionalize a culture of formality with moral principles and stability. We can see throughout the turn of the century that this dominant culture of genteel is never fully mixed with America 's new mass culture they yearned for. Even though the genteel tried to strengthen the concept of social order and urban policy; the society decided to change their conformed behaviors from institutional order to a fantasy universe that went against social genteel norms. Coney Island 's foreign playhouse of amusement captured the public 's