Christian Fundamentalism is easily traced as a response to Christian Liberalism; you can find pretty good information on both on wikipedia.
Here's a caricature of how it went down:
(mid 1800s, Liberalism): "Hey, it turns out when you look at ancient copies of the Bible from 2 different areas, there are occasional differences in spelling and word order. Therefore, the Bible is totally fiction, but teaches moderately useful lessons, so long as we understand the figurative language it's using."
(late 1800s, Fundamentalism): "What? You guys are quacks. The King James Bible is totally reliable because God specially preserved it. Therefore, there's no figurative language whatsoever, everything is literal."
It's my perception that Fundamentalism's influence is waning; I run into far fewer "fundies" than I did during my childhood (but I live in the same house and attend the same church.) In surveys I've seen, a lower percentage of people self-identify as Fundamentalist, and a lower percentage agree with certain key Fundamentalist doctrines. They may be louder than before, but I don't think they're any more prevalent.
Here's a caricature of how it went down:
(mid 1800s, Liberalism): "Hey, it turns out when you look at ancient copies of the Bible from 2 different areas, there are occasional differences in spelling and word order. Therefore, the Bible is totally fiction, but teaches moderately useful lessons, so long as we understand the figurative language it's using."
(late 1800s, Fundamentalism): "What? You guys are quacks. The King James Bible is totally reliable because God specially preserved it. Therefore, there's no figurative language whatsoever, everything is literal."
It's my perception that Fundamentalism's influence is waning; I run into far fewer "fundies" than I did during my childhood (but I live in the same house and attend the same church.) In surveys I've seen, a lower percentage of people self-identify as Fundamentalist, and a lower percentage agree with certain key Fundamentalist doctrines. They may be louder than before, but I don't think they're any more prevalent.