In the turn of the twentieth century, the United States experienced a great amount of change. During a time of immense financial struggle and an increase in immigration, the country faced a shift in the its position on both social and economic statuses. As Americans coped with the excessive change they were experiencing, they turned to new explanations for issues, such as Social Darwinism, causing increasing effects from this change. Frank Norris shaped his novel McTeague as a window into the time period and its society, influenced by the abundant change in the United States, the effects of said change, his personal experiences of the times, and his beliefs in Naturalism. Parallels can be drawn between the life of Frank Norris and the storyline …show more content…
In the Progressive Era in the United States, from 1890 to the 1920s, the nation experienced a massive influx of immigrants. Many settled into cities that held the possibility of employment. Thousands of Chinese workers alone came to California, the setting of McTeague, to work in the gold mines ("Immigration Period of Restrictions"). It is clear that the nation opened its doors to a great number of immigrants, but they were only welcomed if they agreed to become '"good Americans" (Mercer, "Imagine Living Through the Progress"). However, there is no doubt that these immigrants were still discriminated against; some were seen to hold an inferior status no matter what they achieved. This flood of new Americans prompted the rise of a new view of social status in the U.S. and with this new collection of people incorporated into the existing population of citizens, a sense of separation between classes was heightened and race began to define one's level of superiority. This separation also contributed to the growth of Social Darwinism, a theory of social organization that was loosely based on Charles Darwin's scientific theory of natural selection and focused on race and social class to determine biological