The literature of Reconstruction : not in plain black and white /

In this groundbreaking new study, author Brook Thomas argues that literary analysis can enhance our historical understanding of race and Reconstruction. The standard view that Reconstruction ended with the Compromise of 1877 is a retrospective construction. Works of literature provide the perspectiv...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Thomas, Brook, 1947- (Author)
Format: Manuscript
Language:English
Published: Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press, [2017]
Subjects:

MARC

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264 1 |a Baltimore :  |b Johns Hopkins University Press,  |c [2017] 
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300 |a xv, 378 pages :  |b illustrations ;  |c 25 cm. 
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504 |a Includes bibliographical references and index. 
520 |a In this groundbreaking new study, author Brook Thomas argues that literary analysis can enhance our historical understanding of race and Reconstruction. The standard view that Reconstruction ended with the Compromise of 1877 is a retrospective construction. Works of literature provide the perspective of those who continued to see possibilities for its renewal well past 1877. Historians have long tried to reconcile social history's emphasis on the local with political history's emphasis on the national. Literature creates national political allegories while focusing on events in a particular locale. Moreover, the debate over Reconstruction was a debate about state legitimacy as well as specific laws. It was a question of foundational myths as well as foundational legal principles. Literature's political allegories allow us to recreate those debates rather than view the end of Reconstruction as a foregone conclusion. Because many of the issues raised by Reconstruction remain unresolved, those debates continue into the present. Chapters treat how the racial issues raised by Reconstruction are interwoven with debates over state v. national authority, efforts to combat terrorism (the KKK), the paternalism of welfare, economic expansion and the question of who should rightly inherit the nation's past. Thomas examines authors who opposed Reconstruction, authors who supported it and authors who struggled with mixed feelings. This exciting text will set the standard in literary historical studies for decades to come. 
650 0 |a American literature  |y 19th century  |x History and criticism.  |0 http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2007101047 
650 0 |a Politics and literature  |z United States  |x History  |y 19th century.  |0 http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2008109611 
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