University
of Vermont, Department of History, Professor J. Carr
History 296A: Community in Early
America
Spring 2005. Wednesday 3:30-6:15 in Wheeler 102
Office Hours: MWF 10;30-11:30 and by appointment
Office: 211 Wheeler 656-3533
Jacqueline.Carr@uvm.edu
This course examines the formation, development and nature of community
in pre-Civil War America. We will study the foundation and
development of specific communities and the evolution of community
institutions. Issues concerning family, gender, ethnicity,
race, deviancy, consumption and material culture, rural life, urban
life, and town planning will also be considered. The readings for
this course span almost forty years of scholarship beginning in the
1960s when the study of community became a scholarly concern and
pursuit, moving it from the field of antiquarian local and genealogical
history. Students will also undertake a research project of their
own on some aspect of community history.
Required Readings Available in the
Bookstore:
Sumner Chilton Powell, Puritan
Village: The Formation of a New England Town
Helena M. Wall, Fierce
Communion: Family and Community in Early America
Gary B. Nash, Forging Freedom:
The Formation of Philadelphia’s Black
Community,
1740-1820
Jacqueline Barbara Carr, After The
Siege: A Social History of Boston, 1775-1800
Lisa C. Tolbert, Constructing
Townscapes: Space and Society in Antebellum
Tennessee
John Mack Faragher, Sugar
Creek: Life on the Illinois Prairie
David Schuyler, The New Urban
Landscape: The Redefinition of City Form in
Nineteenth-Century
America
Course Procedures: This
is a demanding reading course and the format of the meetings is based
upon seminar discussion not lectures. Class discussion is the
foundation of this course and, in this light, each student is
responsible for helping to make the course either a success or a
failure. It is critical that you come prepared with the readings
completed as assigned below. If it seems that students are not
completing the required reading, submission of weekly reading outlines
of two-three pages will be required. Therefore, it is a good idea
to read critically, take notes on the thesis, themes, arguments, and
general content of each assigned reading and come to class with
comments, ideas and questions. Students will choose (or be
assigned) weeks when they will be the discussion leaders. There
will be primary source materials (excerpts from town records, city
directories and the like) distributed and discussed in class.
Method of Evaluation for Grades:
20% 5 pp. essay on materials covered weeks 1-4. Due
February 16, week 5.
20% 5 pp. essay on materials covered weeks 5-9. Due
March 30, week 10.
10% 4 pp. book review on either Construction Townscapes,
Sugar Creek, or The New
Urban Landscape. See reading schedule for due
dates.
40% 12-15 pp. primary/secondary source research paper. Due
May 11.
10% Attendance and participation.
Reading Schedule:
Week 1/January 19:
Introduction
The Dynamics of Community Formation and Development
Week 2/January 26:
Read Powell, Puritan Village
Week 3/February 2:
Journal and Reserve Readings on Community
Dinkin, Robert J. "
Seating
the
Meetinghouse in Early Massachusetts," in Robert Blair St. George,
ed.
Material Life in America.
Kenneth A. Lockridge and Alan Kreider, “
The
Evolution of Massachusetts
Town Government, 1640-1740,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d Ser.,
XXIII
(1966): pp. 549-574. Also in Colonial America: Essays in
Politics and Social Development 1st ed.
John Demos, “
Notes
on Life in Plymouth Colony,” William and Mary
Quarterly, 3d Ser., XXII (1965): pp. 264-286. Also in Colonial
America 3d ed.
Philip J. Greven, “
Family
Structure in Seventeenth-Century Andover,
Massachusetts,” William and Mary Quarterly, 3d Ser., XXIII (1966):
234-256. Also in Colonial America, 3d ed.
Donna Merwick, "
Dutch
Townsmen and Land Use: A Spatial
Perspective on Seventeenth-Century Albany, New York,” William and
Mary
Quarterly, 3d Ser., XXXVII (Jan. 1980): 53-78.
Rutman, Darret B., "
Assessing
the Little Communities of America"
William and Mary Quarterly
Family and Community
Week 4/February
9: Wall, Fierce
Communion
Living on the Edge of Community: The Outcasts [Paper
Due February 16]
Week 5/February 16:
Journal and Reserve Readings on Witchcraft
Community Within Community: African-Americans in the
Eighteenth-Century
Week 6/February 23:
Read Nash, Forging Freedom
chapters 1-4
Week 7/March 2:
Read Nash, Forging Freedom chapters 5-8
Special Collections: An Overview of the Collections & Library
Resources
Week 8/March 9:
Meet in Special Collections. Additional information to
follow.
Community in Wartime: Boston in the Era of the American Revolution
Week 9/March
16
Read: Carr, After The Siege
Spring
Recess: March 23
Community Development in the Nineteenth-Century Trans-Appalachian West
Week 10/March
30: [Paper due March 30]
Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes, Part I
Week 11/April 6:
Tolbert, Constructing Townscapes,
Part II.
[Book review due if selecting
Tolbert]
Community Development in Rural Nineteenth-Century America
Week 12/April 13:
Mack Faragher, Sugar Creek,
Parts I, II, III
Week 13/April 20:
Mack Faragher, Sugar Creek,
Parts IV & V
[Book review due if selecting Mack
Faragher]
The “Pastoral City”: Seeking the Livable Urban Community
Week 14/April 27:
Schuyler, The New Urban Landscape Part
I. Chapters 1-3
Week 15/May 4:
Schuyler, The New Urban Landscape
Parts II & III chapters 4-10
[Book review due if selecting Schuyler]
Final Exam Day: May 11 Research Paper Due
Posted
by hope.greenberg@uvm.edu,
27-Jan-2005
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