HIST 341: The History of the Early Republic (HC): Background

The essays in this collection explore how socioeconomic inequality is indispensable to a true understanding of the transition from the early modern to modern era in North America and the rest of the Atlantic world. They examine the cultural development of a new and aspirational middle class and its relationship to changing economic conditions and the articulation of corporate and industrial ideologies in the era of the American Revolution and beyond. A final section shifts the focus to the poor and vulnerable--tenant farmers, infant paupers, and the victims of capital punishment.

A Companion to American Cultural History offers a historiographic overview of the scholarship, with special attention to the major studies and debates that have shaped the field, and an assessment of where it is currently headed. 30 essays explore the history of American culture at all analytic levels Written by scholarly experts well-versed in the questions and controversies that have activated interest in this burgeoning field Part of the authoritative Blackwell Companions to American History series Provides both a chronological and thematic approach: topics range from British America in the Eighteenth Century to the modern day globalization of American Culture; thematic approaches include gender and sexuality and popular culture

Reviews historiographical developments and major themes in the history of nineteenth-century America. Twenty-seven scholars, all specialists in their own thematic areas, examine the key debates and historiography. Essays cover politics, periods, economy, class formation, ethnicity, gender roles, regions, culture and ideas.

Entries from previous editions have been updated and revised in light of historical developments and current scholarship, and more than 800 new entries cover recent events and topics not covered previously. For the first time, illustrations and maps are incorporated into the main body of the work; a collection of primary source documents appears in Volume 9.

This volume bring together 23 essays arranged in three parts: changing historical perspectives; colonial British America; and the American revolution.

Social structures that shaped American life, including family, work, leisure, social movements, and patterns of mobility and settlements, are central to the work, as are themes of race,gender, ethnicity, and class. Sensitive to transnational developments, the volume draws extensively on new literature on slavery, health and disease, sexuality, women's activism, and technology's impact on everyday life.

Offers authoritative essays on the history and historiography of the institution of slavery in the New World. Includes essays on colonial and antebellum America as well as thematic essays on comparative slavery, the economics of slavery, historical methodology in the field, slavery and the law, for instance.