e era and mindset of the Americans involved in this war. For instance, in his chapter entitled “Visions of Romance and Chivalry” he links the romanticized notions of the war and soldiers in the popular imagination with the romanticism prevalent in literature and popular in the era. In the epilogue entitled “A New Epoch in American History” Johannsen argues that many Americans saw victory in the first foreign war as a sign of America proving itself as a man after a period of infancy, “To many Americans, the Mexican War signaled the advance of the United States from youth into manhood” (Johannsen 310). Johannsen argues throughout that the popular media expression of American perceptions regarding the war conceal deeper ideological beliefs, such as Manifest Destiny and other concepts prevalent in American thought at the time. The unfolding of these concepts through media expression of the popular opinion brings Jo
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