Focusing on key works of late-nineteenth and early- twentieth-century American literary realism, Phillip Barrish traces the emergence of new ways of gaining intellectual prestige--that is, new ways of gaining some degree of cultural recognition. Through extended readings of works by Henry James, William Dean Howells, Abraham Cahan, and Edith Wharton, Barrish emphasizes the differences between realist modes of cultural authority and those associated with the rise of the social sciences.