Answer:
As a group, the transcendentalists led the celebration of the American experiment as one of individualism and self-reliance. They took progressive stands on women's rights, abolition, reform, and education. They criticized government, organized religion, laws, social institutions, and creeping industrialization.
How did transcendentalism affected the American writer? Greatly influenced by Emerson's ideas, Henry David Thoreau and Walt Whitman advanced the movement with their literary contributions. Transcendentalism encouraged man to look closely at the world, to look closely at himself, and to be radically honest about what he sees.