Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Tweet-a-Week III: Oneida Community

Based in Oneida, New York, the Oneida Community was a religious sect focused on the practices of John Humphrey Noyes. Noyes believed in "Perfectionism", meaning once you're a Christian, you're saved from all your sins forever. The Community was most well known for it's polygamous nature. Declaring "complex marriage", it was actually a rule that every man was considered married to every woman, and vise versa.

Whitman, and Leaves of Grass, does have many sexual themes associated with it. As such, many parallels could be drawn between Whitman and the Oneida Community due to the similar nature of their "free love". There is also a parallel between the lack of boundaries between people. The "every man married to every woman, and every woman married to every man" thing, kind of reminds me of Whitman's constant "I am you and you are me" declarations made in Song of Myself. I can see how Whitman would find inspiration from this unorthodox group of people.

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