Nomadland(s): Frontiers and wastelands in the twenty-first century

Frederick Jackson Turner’s (1893) ‘Frontier thesis’ introduced a new and influential way of interpreting American history and culture. His approach presented the frontier as both a geographical space and a symbolic force, one able to shape the Americans’ character through struggle, expansion and reinvention. Although challenged by several scholars, especially those re-examining the history of the American West, Turner’s ideas continue to echo within the American imagination. Concepts such as democracy, freedom and particularly movement still support an enduring mythology that defines the United States’s sense of identity and possibility. In this article, we will examine how the ideas of the frontier, of movement and nomadism are dealt with in Jessica Bruder’s (2017) nonfiction book Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century , as well as in Chloé Zhao’s (2020) movie adaptation, Nomadland , as a complement. Mainly using Deleuze and Guattari’s approach in A Thousand Plateaus , as well as Braidotti’s Nomadic Subjects , we will examine how Bruder’s work and its main female protagonists engage with the mythical framework of the American West, with the American Dream and with the road. Thus, this article aims to uncover the lingering ideologies and mythical structures that continue to shape contemporary American life and mobility.