My Wish Lists Login / Join

Through a Glass Darkly

Reflections on Personal Identity in Early America

By: Ronald Hoffman (Editor), Mechal Sobel (Editor), Fredrika J. Teute (Editor)

Write A Review

Paperback | 22 September 1997

At a Glance

Paperback
480 Pages

Edition Type
New edition

Dimensions(cm)
23.39 x 15.6 x 2.72

Paperback

$134.75

or 4 interest-free payments of $33.69 with

Ships in 5 to 10 business days

These thirteen original essays are provocative explorations in the construction and representation of self in America's colonial and early republican eras. Highlighting the increasing importance of interdisciplinary research for the field of early American history, these leading scholars in the field extend their reach to literary criticism, anthropology, psychology, and material culture. The collection is organized into three parts--Histories of Self, Texts of Self, and Reflections on Defining Self. Individual essays examine the significance of dreams, diaries, and carved chests, murder and suicide, Indian kinship, and the experiences of African American sailors. Gathered in celebration of the Institute of Early American History and Culture's fiftieth anniversary, these imaginative inquiries will stimulate critical thinking and open new avenues of investigation on the forging of self-identity in early America. The contributors are W. Jeffrey Bolster, T. H. Breen, Elaine Forman Crane, Greg Dening, Philip Greven, Rhys Isaac, Kenneth A. Lockridge, James H. Merrell, Donna Merwick, Mary Beth Norton, Mechal Sobel, Alan Taylor, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, and Richard White.

Industry Reviews

Every historian serious about early America, or historiography in general, should own this landmark collection."Choice" In addition to offering fresh insight into problems of identity, the book in all its variety makes terrific reading.Patricia Meyer Spacks, University of Virginia ï¿½Vï¿½iews of daily life are broadened and what it meant to live in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century America is reexamined."Journal of American Culture" ï¿½Rï¿½ich and diverse."Reviews in American History" "In addition to offering fresh insight into problems of identity, the book in all its variety makes terrific reading.Patricia Meyer Spacks, University of Virginia" [V]iews of daily life are broadened and what it meant to live in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century America is reexamined."Journal of American Culture" "Every historian serious about early America, or historiography in general, should own this landmark collection."Choice"" A compelling look at a growing trend in writing early American history."Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography" [R]ich and diverse."Reviews in American History"

Shipping

	Standard Shipping	Express Shipping
Metro postcodes:	$9.99	$14.95
Regional postcodes:	$9.99	$14.95
Rural postcodes:	$9.99	$14.95

How to return your order

At Booktopia, we offer hassle-free returns in accordance with our returns policy. If you wish to return an item, please get in touch with Booktopia Customer Care.

Additional postage charges may be applicable.

Defective items

If there is a problem with any of the items received for your order then the Booktopia Customer Care team is ready to assist you.

For more info please visit our Help Centre.

You Can Find This Book In

Non-Fiction History Regional & National History History of the Americas Reference, Information & Interdisciplinary Subjects Interdisciplinary Studies General Studies Society & Culture Cultural Studies Earliest Times to Present Day Early Modern History from 1450 to 1700 Modern History from 1700 to 1900

Sociology & Anthropology Anthropology Social & Cultural Anthropology, Ethnography Specific Events & Topics in History Social & Cultural History

Preface
Introduction: In Search of a Metaphor
Histories of Self Histories of Self
"The Cast of His Countenance": Reading Andrew Montour
Communal Definitions of Gendered Identity in Seventeenth-Century English America
Making History: The Force of Public Opinion and the Last Years of Slavery in Revolutionary Massachusetts
"The Unhappy Stephen Arnold": An Episode of Murder and Penitence in the Early Republic
The Suicide of a Notary: Language, Personal Identity, and Conquest in Colonial New York
Texts of Self Texts of Self
The Revolution in Selves: Black and White Inner Aliens
Stories and Constructions of Identity: Folk Tellings and Diary Inscriptions in Revolutionary Virginia
Hannah Barnard's Cupboard: Female Property and Identity in Eighteenth-Century New England
Colonial Self-Fashioning: Paradoxes and Pathologies in the Construction of Genteel Identity in Eighteenth-Century America
Reflections on Defining Self Reflections on Defining Self
The Self Shaped and Misshaped:The Protestant TemperamentReconsidered
"I Have Suffer'd Much Today": The Defining Force of Pain in Early America
"Although I am dead, I am not entirely dead. I have left a second of myself": Constructing Self and Persons on the Middle Ground of Early America
An Inner Diaspora: Black Sailors Making Selves
Index
Notes on the Contributors
Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.

Through a Glass Darkly

Reflections on Personal Identity in Early America

At a Glance

Paperback

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

You Can Find This Book In

More in Social & Cultural History

Australia's Bush Legends

The heroes, larrikins and adventurers who shaped the nation

The Last Best Place on the Internet

A Human History of Wikipedia

100 Years of Australian Songwriting

How Songs Have Shaped Identity, Culture, and History Over the Past Century

All Roads Lead to Rome

Why we think of the Roman Empire daily

Bondi Terror

The tragedy, the courage, the aftermath

A Suitable Man

The Eccentric Empire of Fletcher Jones

Born in 1956? What else happened? 2024 edition

What else happened?

Dark Emu

Aboriginal Australia and the Birth of Agriculture

Born in 1946? What else happened?

What else happened?

Women, Race & Class

Penguin Modern Classics

The Dawn of Everything

A New History of Humanity

The Finest Hotel in Kabul

WOMEN'S NON FICTION PRIZE 2026 WINNER - A People's History of Afghanistan

Said the Dead

The new book from the award-winning author of A GHOST IN THE THROAT

First Knowledges Politics

Philosophical Ordering by Country

Surveying the Wild Abyss

Unravelling Settler Memory

The Rest is History

The official book from the makers of the hit podcast

A World Appears

A Journey Into Consciousness

The Finest Hotel in Kabul

WOMEN'S NON FICTION PRIZE 2026 WINNER - A People's History of Afghanistan

Australia: A History

From convict colony to great democracy, by the former Prime Minister with a foreword by Geoffrey Blainey

The Cats of Australia

From shipmates to soulmates - a complicated history of moggies Down Under, by Australia's only cat historian

Lessons of History

The Origins of Totalitarianism

Penguin Modern Classics

Nexus

A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI

Blackbirding

A reckoning with the Australian slave trade

This product is categorised by