Throughout the duration of American Literature you can see the evolution if you will, of the peoples thoughts and beliefs on religion, the disenfranchised, and the conflict between individual rights and the group as a whole. .
These comparisons may well be easy to recognize now as we look back three hundred years, but they were not as identifiable as time lapsed in the past. There are no definitive cut off dates of when one idea was forgotten and another undertaken, therefore we now can analyze and identify when and how these periods can be separated.
John Smith was considered to be a highly regarded individual of his time. Being one of many colonists he experienced the preliminary dawning of a new nation. During this time religion was used as the law and it was to be abided by at all times. There was not much flexibility involved. You could say during this time period people were "hardcore" with their religion. The disenfranchised of this time period hardly had a voice during this time period because open-mindedness hadn't evolved yet. If a woman were to speak up she would have been looked at in disbelief. The will of the group had a strong foundation during this time period because everyone wanted to stick together during the time of transition from Europe. People needed cohesion to develop new neighborhoods and families in an area, which was unfamiliar and new. Obviously, there were some people fighting for their individual rights as citizen, but for the most part you would rarely see an annex from the whole during this time.
As America began to change into a revolutionary period you began to see more independency and "Self Reliance" than before. A huge list of authors were born during this time period, giving a large spectrum of opinions and outlooks. Frederick Douglass became one of Americas first acclaimed African-American writer to reflect and portray the life of a slave, which he was.