The Semantics of Sin: Profanity, Reform, and Cultural Authority in Progressive America

During the Progressive Era, language reform movements such as the Anti-Profanity League sought to regulate everyday speech as part of broader efforts to preserve public morality and cultural identity. This paper examines the rhetorical strategies and cultural assumptions underpinning the anti-profanity crusade, focusing especially on Reverend Roland D. Sawyer's leadership. Using historical sources including league literature, newspaper accounts, personal letters, organizational records, and sermons, it argues that profanity was framed not merely as a religious or moral failure but as a threat to social cohesion, character, and national values. Efforts to suppress swearing reveal how language functioned as a marker of group membership, social status, and identity, and how campaigns to regulate it aimed to assert control over public behavior and cultural standards. The anti-profanity movement, therefore, highlights the complex interplay between speech, morality, reform efforts, and social order in American reform efforts at the turn of the twentieth century.