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Showing papers in "The American Historical Review in 1996"





MonographDOI
TL;DR: This paper explored the confrontational space in which Haiti is created and recreated in fiction and fact, text and ritual, discourse and practice, and argued for the consideration of both vodou rituals and narrative fiction as repositories of history.
Abstract: This text charts the cultural imagination of Haiti, not only by reconstructing the island's history, but by highlighting ambiguities and complexities that have been ignored. It investigates the confrontational space in which Haiti is created and recreated in fiction and fact, text and ritual, discourse and practice. The book also argues for the consideration of both vodou rituals and narrative fiction as repositories of history.

240 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The reading of listening in Paris as mentioned in this paper describes the gradual pacification of audiences from loud and unruly listeners to the attentive public we know today by analyzing the political, musical, and aesthetic factors that produced more engaged listening.
Abstract: Beginning with the simple question, 'Why did audiences grow silent?' \"Listening in Paris\" gives a spectator's-eye view of opera and concert life from the Old Regime to the Romantic era, describing the transformation in musical experience from social event to profound aesthetic encounter. James H. Johnson recreates the experience of audiences during these rich decades with brio and wit. Woven into the narrative is an analysis of the political, musical, and aesthetic factors that produced more engaged listening. Johnson shows the gradual pacification of audiences from loud and unruly listeners to the attentive public we know today. Drawing from a wide range of sources - novels, memoirs, police files, personal correspondence, newspaper reviews, architectural plans, and the like - Johnson brings the performances to life: the hubbub of eighteenth-century opera, the exuberance of Revolutionary audiences, Napoleon's musical authoritarianism, the bourgeoisie's polite consideration. He singles out the music of Gluck, Haydn, Rossini, and Beethoven as especially important in forging new ways of hearing. This book's theoretical edge will appeal to cultural and intellectual historians in many fields and periods.

218 citations




Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Enchantment of Appearances as discussed by the authors is a well-known metaphor for fashion and the West: The Aristocratic moment18Ch. I Fashion and the Modern World: A Century of Fashion55Ch. IIOpen Fashion88Pt. 2Consummate FashionCh. IVThe Seduction of Things134Ch. VAdvertising on the Offensive156Ch. VIIMeaning Carries On203Ch. VIIIThe Progressive Shifting of the Social226Epilogue242Notes253Works Cited265Index271
Abstract: ForewordIntroduction3Pt. 1The Enchantment of AppearancesCh. IFashion and the West: The Aristocratic Moment18Ch. IIA Century of Fashion55Ch. IIIOpen Fashion88Pt. 2Consummate FashionCh. IVThe Seduction of Things134Ch. VAdvertising on the Offensive156Ch. VICulture, Media Style174Ch. VIIMeaning Carries On203Ch. VIIIThe Progressive Shifting of the Social226Epilogue242Notes253Works Cited265Index271

179 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors show how women scientists made significant contributions effort, ranging from engineering and nutrition (where both Margaret Mead and Rachel Carson worked well outside their areas of expertise) to metallurgy and the Manhattan Project, and conclude that the period from 1940 to 1972 was a time when American women were encouraged to pursue an education in science in order to participate in the great professional opportunities that science promised.
Abstract: The acute manpower shortages brought on by the war seemed to hold out new hope for women professionals, especially in the sciences. In one of the first propaganda films produced by the United States Office of War Information in 1942, Katharine Hepburn narrated a script written by Eleanor Roosevelt, urging women to apply for jobs in government industrial science projects. But the public posture of welcoming women into the scientific professions masked a deep-seated opposition to change. Most "scientific" jobs for women were entry-level, and promotions to higher positions reserved for men. This text shows how women scientists nonetheless made significant contributions effort, ranging from engineering and nutrition (where both Margaret Mead and Rachel Carson worked well outside their areas of expertise) to metallurgy and the Manhattan Project. But it tells also of the post-war period, when women scientists were told to accept demotion "cheerfully" and American colleges began concerted efforts to "get the old girls out" and replace them with all-male - and therefore higher-paid and more prestigious - faculty. The author concludes that the period from 1940 to 1972 was a time when American women were encouraged to pursue an education in science in order to participate in the great professional opportunities that science promised. Yet the patriarchal structure and values of universities, government, and industry confronted women with obstacles that continued to frustrate and subordinate them. Nevertheless, women scientists made genuine contributions to their fields, grew in professional stature, and laid the foundation for the period after 1972 which saw real breakthroughs on the status of women in America.

177 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The identification of coherent periods of history involves much more than the simple discovery of self-evident turning points in the past: it depends on prior decisions about the issues and processes that are most important for the shaping of human societies, and it requires the establishment of criteria or principles that enable historians to sort through masses of information and recognize patterns of continuity and change.
Abstract: Periodization ranks among the more elusive tasks of historical Scholarship. As practicing historians well know, the identification of coherent periods of history involves much more than the simple discovery of self-evident turning points in the past: it depends on prior decisions about the issues and processes that are most important for the shaping of human societies, and it requires the establishment of criteria or principles that enable historians to sort through masses of information and recognize patterns of continuity and change. Even within the framework of a single society, changes in perspective can call the coherence of conventionally recognized periods into question, as witness Joan Kelly’s famous essay “Did Women Have a Renaissance?” or Dietrich Gerhard’s concept of “old Europe.”

167 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The most prosperous twelve months ever, capping the country's fourth straight year of economic expansion, were attributable to the American consumer who continued spending as if there were no tomorrow.
Abstract: WHEN THE EDITORS OF TIME MAGAZINE set out to tell readers in an early January 1965 cover story why the American economy had flourished during the previous year, they explained it in terms that had become the conventional wisdom of postwar America. The most prosperous twelve months ever, capping the country's fourth straight year of economic expansion, were attributable to the American consumer, "who continued spending as if there were no tomorrow." According to Time's economics lesson, consumers, business, and government "created a nonvicious circle: spending created more production, production created wealth, wealth created more spending." In this simplified Keynesian model of economic growth, "the consumer is the key to our economy." As R. H. Macy's board chair Jack Straus explained to Time's readers, "When the country has a recession, it suffers not so much from problems of production as from problems of consumption." And in prosperous times like today, "Our economy keeps growing because our ability to consume is endless. The consumer goes on spending regardless of how many possessions he has. The luxuries of today are the necessities of tomorrow." A demand economy built on mass consumption had brought the United States out of the doldrums of the Great Depression and World War II, and its strength in the postwar period continued to impress those like retail magnate Straus whose own financial future depended on it.1 Although Straus and his peers invested great energy and resources in developing new strategies for doing business in this mass-consumption economy, historians


BookDOI
TL;DR: The Envy of Angels as discussed by the authors explores the history of ideas and higher learning and opens a new view of intellectual and social life in eleventh and early twelfth-century Europe.
Abstract: Before the rise of universities, cathedral schools educated students in a course of studies aimed at perfecting their physical presence, their manners, and their eloquence. The formula of cathedral schools was "letters and manners" (litterae et mores), which asserts a pedagogic program as broad as the modern "letters and science." The main instrument of what C. Stephen Jaeger calls "charismatic pedagogy" was the master's personality, his physical presence radiating a transforming force to his students. In The Envy of Angels, Jaeger explores this intriguing chapter in the history of ideas and higher learning and opens a new view of intellectual and social life in eleventh- and early twelfth-century Europe.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Myth of the Stolen Legacy of the Egyptian Mystery System as mentioned in this paper is based on the concept of cultural dependency in the Egyptian mystery system, which was introduced in the early 20th century.
Abstract: * Introduction * Myths of African Origins * Ancient Myths of Cultural Dependency * The Myth of the Egyptian Mystery System * The Myth of the Stolen Legacy * Conclusion * Epilogue




Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on the long-range impact of New Deal policy on American politics and the legacy of the modern housing initiative for contemporary public policy debates, and conclude that modern housing ideas failed to define the longterm thrust of federal policy, but did influence a short-lived programme of the Public Works Administration, seen in the case studies of the Carl Mackley Houses of Philadelphia and Harlem River houses of New York.
Abstract: The basic shape of American federal policy in housing as in many other areas, was determined during the New Deal, but not without conflict among movements and intellectuals advocating alternative directions. One of these was "modern housing" - a set of proposals for a radical rethinking of homes and neighbourhoods. Supporters of this approach hoped that a significant proportion of American homes could be provided by a broadly targeted, noncommercial housing sector, supported by the federal government. They urged comprehensively planned neighbourhoods with generous public spaces, a range of public services, and resident participation in design and administration. While modern housing ideas failed to define the long-term thrust of federal policy, they did influence a short-lived programme of the Public Works Administration, seen in the case studies of the Carl Mackley Houses of Philadelphia and Harlem River houses of New York. The author concludes with a chapter on the long-range impact of New Deal policy on American politics and the legacy of the modern housing initiative for contemporary public policy debates.


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, a detailed ethnographic and historial analysis of a southern Indian merchant-banking caste provides an analysis of the links between Indian business practice and social and religious issues, and argues that caste and commerce are inextricably linked to the formation and distribution of capital.
Abstract: This detailed ethnographic and historial analysis of a southern Indian merchant-banking caste provides an analysis of the links between Indian business practice and social and religious issues. It explores non-capitalist economic formations and the impact of colonial rule on indigenous commercial systems, and argues that caste and commerce are inextricably linked to the formation and distribution of capital. The author challenges the assumptions that all castes are organized either by marriage alliances or status hierarchy, and that caste structures are incompatible with the conduct of business.

BookDOI
TL;DR: Ferster's chapter on Gower, in this new study of the Furstenspiegel tradition in the late Middle Ages, is a lengthened version of the essay entitled "O Political Gower" as discussed by the authors that appeared in the 1993 special issue of Mediaevalia (reviewed in JGN 13, no. 2, pp. 9-10).
Abstract: Ferster's chapter on Gower, in this new study of the Furstenspiegel tradition in the late Middle Ages, is a lengthened version of the essay entitled "O Political Gower" that appeared in the 1993 special issue of Mediaevalia (reviewed in JGN 13, no. 2, pp. 9-10). Her Mediaevalia piece focussed on the ways in which Gower embedded commentary on contemporary issues in the "Mirror for Princes" in Book 7 of CA. Mixing some subtle rereadings with a sharp alertness to context, she found beneath the poet's obvious deference to the king some pointed advice, particularly on the very subject of advice itself: "The key to [Richard's] success," Gower suggests, according to Ferster, "is not his choice among aristocratic advisors, but his willingness to bend to hear the complaints of the commoners" (Mediaevalia 16 [1993):41). Ferster broadens her analysis in this lengthened version by giving more attention to the language of CA, demonstrating both that Gower's deference is more marked in his English poem than it is in either MO or VC, and also that the language that he uses in describing petitions to kings echoes the idiom of contemporary political discourse. She also comments at greater length on what she sees as Gower's representation of the voice of the gentry in contemporary disputes. Finally, she adds a completely new discussion of a group of tales in Book 7 — "Diogenes and Aristippus," "Tarquin and Aruns," and "Ahab and Micaiah" — that, in the paradoxes they raise, seem to bring into question what she calls the "hermeneutics of counsel" and to suggest, before offering an alternative in attention to the vox populi, the futility of a king's dependence upon his own counsellors. The inclusion of her discussion of Gower within the frame of her broader study also allows Ferster to place Book 7 much more persuasively within the tradition of the "advice for princes" from which it derives. The two main themes of Ferster's book are the paradoxes and contradictions inherent in any situation in which a poet or author presumes to advise his king, and the ways in which each of the various works that make up the Furstenspiegel tradition, beginning with the Secretum Secretorum, can be found to contain a specific contemporary agenda beneath the gestures of deference and the overt endorsement of the monarch's power that are inevitable to the genre. In England in particular, she argues, the principal of the community's right to impose limitations on the king was embodied in Magna Carta, and discussion of the reciprocal relations between monarch and subjects was often phrased in terms of the right to give and the duty to follow advice. By the fourteenth century there was an active community of political discourse, with different groups staking out their rights to advise the king, and several obvious and well known instances in which either the king himself was deposed or his powers limited. The dangers of opposing the king were nonetheless very real, and the trope of the king's need for good advice provided a justification for what might otherwise be taken as a presumption upon the king's power, while the genre of the manual of advice, offered in presumed deference to the king, could be the safest means for offering critical, if necessarily indirect, comment on policies of special importance to the author. Ferster includes chapters on James Yonge's 1422 English translation of the Secretum Secretorum, on Chaucer's Tale of Melibee, and on Hoccleve's Regement of Princes as well as on CA, and she concludes with a brief consideration of Machiavelli's The Prince. She sets the Melibee in the context of the Appellants' crisis, and argues that both the lapses in Prudence's judgment and Melibee's inability to put her advice into practice represent Chaucer's attempt to deconstruct the ideology of advice by which the Appellants justified their impositions upon Richard's authority. Hoccleve, she argues, mixes his endorsement of the legitimacy of the Lancastrian line with pointed criticism of Prince Henry and discussion of some of the most divisive issues of the last years of his father's reign. Each of these readings, like her comments on Book 7 of CA, raises particular problems, both in Ferster's techniques as a reader and in her interpretation of the contemporary political setting; in the former regard, her emphasis upon the apparently deliberate self-contradictions in both CA and the Melibee depends upon an expectation of a formal and thematic consistency in a work of this sort and of this period that is perhaps unreasonably high. The great merit of her book is that by juxtaposing these works and asking the same sorts of questions about them, she has removed the mask of the authors' self-presentation to their patrons and opened up the whole tradition of the advice to the king to a more critical and more revealing view; and in response to the doctrine that there is no possibility of escape from contemporary ideology, she has convincingly demonstrated the presence of a multitude of dissenting voices, however covert some may be, in the political discourse of late medieval England. [PN. Copyright The John Gower Society. JGN 16.1]

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, a gas oven burner is controlled by a manual rotary valve and a series flow arranged, electrically operated valve and is ignited by a ceramic glow igniter, which is connected across a power source through a manual line switch and an adjustable temperature responsive switching means.
Abstract: Fuel flow to a gas oven burner is controlled by a manual rotary valve and a series flow arranged, electrically operated valve and is ignited by a ceramic glow igniter. The electrically operated valve and glow coil are series connected across a power source through a manual line switch and an adjustable temperature responsive switching means. A control knob, when rotated, rotates the manual rotary valve, actuates the line switch, and adjusts the temperature responsive switching means.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: From Cameralism to Ordoliberalism as discussed by the authors is a transition from rationalism to the science of government, and the evolution of the social market economy can be traced back to National Socialism.
Abstract: Acknowledgements 1. Introduction: from Cameralism to Ordoliberalism 2. Cameralism and the science of government 3. Die Vernunft des List. National economy and the critique of cosmopolitan economy 4. Historical economics, the Methodenstreit, and the economics of Max Weber 5. The Handelshochschulen and the formation of Betriebswirtschaftslehre, 1898-1925 6. The Logical Structure of the Economic World - the rationalist economics of Otto Neurath 7. Capitalism, totalitarianism and the legal order of National Socialism 8. The genealogy of the Social Market Economy: 1937-48 9. The New Economic Order and European economic integration Bibliography Index.



Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, a detailed investigation of the plight of the disabled and deformed in ancient society is presented, focusing on those afflicted with more severe disabilities such as Siamese twins and "Cyclopians".
Abstract: The famous works of Greek and Roman sculpture present an image of anatomical perfection which, as we know from other sources, was quite unrepresentative of the population as a whole. This is a detailed investigation of the plight of the disabled and deformed in ancient society - of the deaf, the blind, the lame; of hunchbacks, dwarfs and giants; and of those afflicted with more severe disabilities such as Siamese twins and "Cyclopians". This work draws on a range of material from drama and poetry, works of history, medical tracts, vase painting and sculpture, mythology and ethnology. It considers the high incidence of disability among the ancients; the jobs and lifestyles available to the disabled, and the prejudice, fuelled by religion, that they encountered. It examines how physiognomic principles were used as a way of stereotyping the deformed, the abuse to which they were regularly subjected; the possible medical options and cures; the religious and scientific explanations for the occurrence of congenital deformity, and the widespread belief in the existence of monstrous races.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors traces the history of adult education in America from its roots in the popular tradition of self-improvement, to present day education outside a college or university setting, and explores the reasons why ordinary citizens turned to the cultivation of knowledge.
Abstract: This book traces the history of adult education in America from its roots in the popular tradition of self-improvement, to present day education outside a college or university setting. The author persuasively links developments in the realm of popular self-improvement to cultural and social forces, and explores the reasons why ordinary citizens turned to the cultivation of knowledge. He aims to unravel the knotted connections between education and society, by focusing on the voluntary pursuit of knowledge on the part of those who were both older and more likely to be gainfully employed than the school-age popoulation. By emphasising the importance of audiences, he sheds new light on the reasons for the shift from ideal of culture (as defined by Matthew Arnold) to such typical twentieth-century motifs as vocational education and public service.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, an extensive study of labour in the social and economic life of Islamic communities around the Mediterranean in the medieval period, 9th-15th century, is presented.
Abstract: This is an extensive study of labour in the social and economic life of Islamic communities around the Mediterranean in the medieval period, 9th-15th century. Based on a large number of primary and secondary sources, it contains a comprehensive dictionary of trades and occupations practised by both men and women, followed by a statistical and textual examination of the division of labour, the distribution of the labour force, occupational structures and the role of labour in the Islamic economy. It also describes ethnic divisions of labour, social status and image. A group of literary sources yields evidence that Muslim theologians, mystics and philosophers gradually formulated a doctrinal framework for labour. This book will prove a valuable resource for any student of medieval Islamic economic and labour history.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The authors explored the role of the Arab press as a Middle Eastern institution, focusing on the circumstances that influenced the growth of Arab media, its own impact on local historical developments, and the long-term effects that early patterns of its emergence have had on later evolution.
Abstract: Newspapers and journalism began in the Middle East in the nineteenth century and evolved during a period of accelerated change which shaped their unique political, social and cultural role. Drawing on a wealth of sources, this study for the first time explores the press as a Middle Eastern institution. It focuses on the circumstances that influences the growth of the Arab press, its own impact on local historical developments, and the long-term effects that early patterns of its emergence have had on later evolution.

MonographDOI
TL;DR: Foster et al. as discussed by the authors examined the process of nation-making in Melanesia by examining the political conditions and cultural assumptions that inform how Melanesians variously imagine a national community.
Abstract: In this theoretically sophisticated volume, contributors examine the process of nation making in Fiji, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu- states that attained formal political independence between 1970 and 1980. The remarkable cultural diversity within these states demands close ethnographic study of different groups and their contesting definitions of nationhood and leads to highly original approaches. The essays explore the political conditions and cultural assumptions that inform how Melanesians variously imagine a national community. The authors interpret a wide range of materials, from political speeches and official ceremonies of state to newspaper advertisements and life crisis rites. They demonstrate both how the legacies of divisive colonial rule, the weakness of the postcolonial state, and the exigencies of capitalist markets undermine the processes of nation making in contemporary Melanesia and how new forms of popular and consumer culture potentially shape an emergent national consciousness. Comparative and historical in its orientation, this book will appeal to readers not only in anthropology but in political science, social history, and cultural studies. It will be of special value to those interested in comparative politics and history, Pacific studies, ethnicity and nationalism, and colonial and postcolonial studies. Robert J. Foster is Assistant Professor of Anthropology, University of Rochester.