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The Identity Of The American Midwest
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Book Synopsis The Identity of the American Midwest by : Andrew Cayton
Download or read book The Identity of the American Midwest written by Andrew Cayton and published by Midwestern History and Culture. This book was released on 2007 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Scholars ponder the regional identity of the Midwest
Book Synopsis The American Midwest by : Andrew R. L. Cayton
Download or read book The American Midwest written by Andrew R. L. Cayton and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2001-09-28 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The American MidwestEssays on Regional History Edited by Andrew R. L. Cayton and Susan E. Gray Is there a Midwest regional identity? Read this lively exploration of the Midwestern identity crisis and find out. "Many would say that ordinariness is the Midwest's 'historic burden.' A writer living in Dayton, Ohio recently suggested that dullness is a Midwestern trait. The Midwest lacks grand scenery: 'Just cornfields, silos, prairies, and the occasional hill. Dull.' He tries to put a nice face on Midwestern dullness by saying that Midwesterners '[l]ike Shaker furniture... are plain in the best sense: unadorned.' Others have found Midwestern ordinariness stultifying. Neil LaBute, who makes films about mean and nasty people, said he was negative because he came from Indiana: 'We're brutally honest in Indiana. We realize we're in the middle of nowhere, and we're very sore about it.'" -- from Chapter Five, "Barbecued Kentuckians and Six-Foot Texas Rangers," by Nicole Etcheson. In a series of often highly personal essays, the authors of The American Midwest -- all of whom are experts on various aspects of Midwestern history -- consider the question of regional identity as a useful way of thinking about the history of the American Midwest. They begin with the assumption that Midwesterners have never been as consciously regional as Western or Southern Americans. They note the peculiar absence of the Midwest from the recent revival of interest in American regionalism among both scholars and journalists. These lively and well-written chapters draw on personal experiences as well as a wide variety of scholarship. This book will stimulate readers into thinking more concretely about what it has meant to be from the Midwest -- and why Midwesterners have traditionally been less assertive about their regional identity than other Americans. It suggests that the best place to find Midwesternness is in the stories the residents of the region have told about themselves and each other. Being Midwestern is mostly a state of mind. It is always fluid, always contested, always being renegotiated. Even the most frequent objection to the existence of Midwestern identity, the fact that no one can agree on its borders, is part of a larger regional conversation about the ways in which Midwesterners imagine themselves and their relationships with other Americans. Andrew R. L. Cayton, Distinguished Professor of History at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, is author of numerous books and articles dealing with the history of the Midwest, including Frontier Indiana (Indiana University Press) and (with Peter S. Onuf) The Midwest and the Nation. Susan E. Gray, Associate Professor of History at Arizona State University, is author of Yankee West: Community Life on the Michigan Frontier as well as numerous articles about Midwest history. Midwestern History and CultureJames H. Madison and Andrew R. L. Cayton, editors July 2001256 pages, 6 1/8 x 9 1/4, index, append.cloth 0-253-33941-3 $35.00 s / £26.50 Contents The Story of the Midwest: An Introduction Seeing the Midwest with Peripheral Vision: Identities, Narratives, and Region Liberating Contrivances: Narrative and Identity in Ohio Valley Histories Pigs in Space, or What Shapes American Regional Cultures? Barbecued Kentuckians and Six-Foot Texas Rangers: The Construction of Midwestern Identity Pi-ing the Type: Jane Grey Swisshelm and the Contest of Midwestern Regionality "The Great Body of the Republic": Abraham Lincoln and the Idea of a Middle West Stories Written in the Blood: Race, Identity, and the Middle West The Anti-region: Place and Identity in the History of the American Middle West Midwestern Distinctiveness Middleness and the Middle West
Book Synopsis The American Midwest by : Andrew R. L. Cayton
Download or read book The American Midwest written by Andrew R. L. Cayton and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2006-11-08 with total page 1918 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This first-ever encyclopedia of the Midwest seeks to embrace this large and diverse area, to give it voice, and help define its distinctive character. Organized by topic, it encourages readers to reflect upon the region as a whole. Each section moves from the general to the specific, covering broad themes in longer introductory essays, filling in the details in the shorter entries that follow. There are portraits of each of the region's twelve states, followed by entries on society and culture, community and social life, economy and technology, and public life. The book offers a wealth of information about the region's surprising ethnic diversity -- a vast array of foods, languages, styles, religions, and customs -- plus well-informed essays on the region's history, culture and values, and conflicts. A site of ideas and innovations, reforms and revivals, and social and physical extremes, the Midwest emerges as a place of great complexity, signal importance, and continual fascination.
Book Synopsis The American Midwest in Film and Literature by : Adam R. Ochonicky
Download or read book The American Midwest in Film and Literature written by Adam R. Ochonicky and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2020-02-04 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do works from film and literature—Sister Carrie, Native Son, Meet Me in St. Louis, Halloween, and A History of Violence, for example—imagine, reify, and reproduce Midwestern identity? And what are the repercussions of such regional narratives and images circulating in American culture? In The American Midwest in Film and Literature: Nostalgia, Violence, and Regionalism, Adam R. Ochonicky provides a critical overview of the evolution, contestation, and fragmentation of the Midwest's symbolic and often contradictory meanings. Using the frontier writings of Frederick Jackson Turner as a starting point, this book establishes a succession of Midwestern filmic and literary texts stretching from the late-19th century through the beginning of the 21st century and argues that the manifold properties of nostalgia have continually transformed popular understandings and ideological uses of the Midwest's place-identity. Ochonicky identifies three primary modes of nostalgia at play across a set of textual objects: the projection of nostalgia onto physical landscapes and into the cultural sphere (nostalgic spatiality); nostalgia as a cultural force that regulates behaviors, identities, and appearances (nostalgic violence); and the progressive potential of nostalgia to generate an acknowledgment and possible rectification of ways in which the flawed past negatively affects the present (nostalgic atonement). While developing these new conceptions of nostalgia, Ochonicky reveals how an under-examined area of regional study has received critical attention throughout the histories of American film and literature, as well as in related materials and discourses. From the closing of the Western frontier to the polarized political and cultural climate of the 21st century, this book demonstrates how film and literature have been and continue to be vital forums for illuminating the complex interplay of regionalism and nostalgia.
Book Synopsis The Sower and the Seer by : Joseph Hogan
Download or read book The Sower and the Seer written by Joseph Hogan and published by Wisconsin Historical Society. This book was released on 2021-02-17 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of twenty-two essays, a product of recent revivals of interest in both Midwestern history and intellectual history, argues for the contributions of interior thinkers and ideas in forming an American identity. The Midwest has been characterized as a fertile seedbed for the germination of great thinkers, but a wasteland for their further growth. The Sower and the Seer reveals that representation to be false. In fact, the region has sustained many innovative minds and been the locus of extraordinary intellectualism. It has also been the site of shifting interpretations—to some a frontier, to others a colonized space, a breadbasket, a crossroads, a heartland. As agrarian reformed (and Michigander) Liberty Hyde Bailey expressed in his 1916 poem “Sower and Seer,” the Midwestern landscape has given rise to significant visionaries, just as their knowledge has nourished and shaped the region. The essays gathered for this collection examine individual thinkers, writers, and leaders, as well as movements and ideas that shaped the Midwest, including rural school consolidation, women’s literary societies, Progressive-era urban planning, and Midwestern radical liberalism. While disparate in subject and style, these essays taken together establish the irrefutable significance of the intellectual history of the American Midwest.
Download or read book Interior Borderlands written by Jon Lauck and published by . This book was released on 2018-01-01 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Collection of essays by over 20 contributors addressing Midwest vs Great Plains identities
Book Synopsis The Midwest and the Nation by : Andrew R. L. Cayton
Download or read book The Midwest and the Nation written by Andrew R. L. Cayton and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 1990-04-22 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Cayton and Onuf have tried to recapture a central place for region in our thinking while, at the same time, incorporating into their analysis the latest scholarship on gender, political behavior, etc. Theirs is a fine blending of the old and the new: old scholarship and new directions." —Malcolm J. Rohrbough "This is an ambitious work that . . . truly beongs on the 'must do' reading list of all midwestern and American historians." —American Historical Review " . . . an impressive interpretive work that will command the attention of regional historians and national scholars alike." —Illinois Historical Journal " . . . an excellent extended historiographic essay that seeks not only to locate the significance of the region created by the early land ordinance but also to raise issues for the historical examination of other regions of the country." —South Dakota History "What makes this book especially interesting and valuable is that it is informed by the post-modern scholar's view that knowledge can never be objective and eternally true; rather, it is subjective and socially constructed, shaped by the political, social, intellectual, and economic environments in which it is formed." —Western Illinois Regional Studies "The book's review of scholarship about the region is exhaustive, as well as brisk and lucid." —American Studies International " . . . a rigorous intellecutal analysis of the region's most important historiography." —Gateway Heritage " . . . an excellent book . . . " —The Annals of Iowa "What is impressive about this densely written work is the number of secondary works incorporated into the text and the importance of the authors' thesis of the considerable influence of happenings in the Midwest of the nineteenth century." —North Dakota History "There is . . . much to be praised in this book, and it will be frequently used and discussed by scholars of the early Midwest." —Journal of American History
Book Synopsis The Rural Midwest Since World War II by : J. L. Anderson
Download or read book The Rural Midwest Since World War II written by J. L. Anderson and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2014-02-01 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: J.L. Anderson seeks to change the belief that the Midwest lacks the kind of geographic coherence, historical issues, and cultural touchstones that have informed regional identity in the American South, West, and Northeast. The goal of this illuminating volume is to demonstrate uniqueness in a region that has always been amorphous and is increasingly so. Midwesterners are a dynamic people who shaped the physical and social landscapes of the great midsection of the nation, and they are presented as such in this volume that offers a general yet informed overview of the region after World War II. The contributors—most of whom are Midwesterners by birth or residence—seek to better understand a particular piece of rural America, a place too often caricatured, misunderstood, and ignored. However, the rural landscape has experienced agricultural diversity and major shifts in land use. Farmers in the region have successfully raised new commodities from dairy and cherries to mint and sugar beets. The region has also been a place where community leaders fought to improve their economic and social well-being, women redefined their roles on the farm, and minorities asserted their own version of the American Dream. The rural Midwest is a regional melting pot, and contributors to this volume do not set out to sing its praises or, by contrast, assume the position of Midwestern modesty and self-deprecation. The essays herein rewrite the narrative of rural decline and crisis, and show through solid research and impeccable scholarship that rural Midwesterners have confronted and created challenges uniquely their own.
Book Synopsis The Making of the Midwest by : Jon K. Lauck
Download or read book The Making of the Midwest written by Jon K. Lauck and published by . This book was released on 2020-05-15 with total page 430 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the American colonial period, what would become the Midwest was the "backcountry," or the area behind the coastal population centers. It was rural and rough, the sort of place that fueled populist resistance to the federal taxation of whiskey. At the time of the Revolution, it was The West, often undifferentiated between north and south and largely associated with Kentucky. In the early years of the republic, however, the regional differentiation deepened and grew until the latter half of the 19th century, when the Midwest emerged as a fully formed region. The essays in this book help explain this process of region-making. Contributors: Christa Adams Brie Swenson Arnold Terry A. Barnhart Michael Leonard Cox Wayne Duerkes Sara Egge Nicole Etcheson Edward O. Frantz Jacob K. Friefeld A. James Fuller Kenyon Gradert Joshua Jeffers Jason Lantzer David C. Miller Marcia Noe C.A. Norling Lisa Payne Ossian Barton E. Price Eric Michael Rhodes Gregory S. Rose Michael J. Sherfy Jason Stacy
Book Synopsis Enduring Nations by : Russell David Edmunds
Download or read book Enduring Nations written by Russell David Edmunds and published by University of Illinois Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Diverse perspectives on midwestern Native American communities
Book Synopsis Muslims of the Heartland by : Edward E. Curtis IV
Download or read book Muslims of the Heartland written by Edward E. Curtis IV and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2023-11-07 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Uncovers the surprising history of Muslim life in the early American Midwest The American Midwest is often thought of as uniformly white, and shaped exclusively by Christian values. However, this view of the region as an unvarying landscape fails to consider a significant community at its very heart. Muslims of the Heartland uncovers the long history of Muslims in a part of the country where many readers would not expect to find them. Edward E. Curtis IV, a descendant of Syrian Midwesterners, vividly portrays the intrepid men and women who busted sod on the short-grass prairies of the Dakotas, peddled needles and lace on the streets of Cedar Rapids, and worked in the railroad car factories of Michigan City. This intimate portrait follows the stories of individuals such as farmer Mary Juma, pacifist Kassem Rameden, poet Aliya Hassen, and bookmaker Kamel Osman from the early 1900s through World War I, the Roaring 20s, the Great Depression, and World War II. Its story-driven approach places Syrian Americans at the center of key American institutions like the assembly line, the family farm, the dance hall, and the public school, showing how the first two generations of Midwestern Syrians created a life that was Arab, Muslim, and American, all at the same time. Muslims of the Heartland recreates what the Syrian Muslim Midwest looked, sounded, felt, and smelled like—from the allspice-seasoned lamb and rice shared in mosque basements to the sound of the trains on the Rock Island Line rolling past the dry goods store. It recovers a multicultural history of the American Midwest that cannot be ignored.
Book Synopsis Finding a New Midwestern History by : Jon K. Lauck
Download or read book Finding a New Midwestern History written by Jon K. Lauck and published by University of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2018-11-01 with total page 391 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In comparison to such regions as the South, the far West, and New England, the Midwest and its culture have been neglected both by scholars and by the popular press. Historians as well as literary and art critics tend not to examine the Midwest in depth in their academic work. And in the popular imagination, the Midwest has never really ascended to the level of the proud, literary South; the cultured, democratic Northeast; or the hip, innovative West Coast. Finding a New Midwestern History revives and identifies anew the Midwest as a field of study by promoting a diversity of viewpoints and lending legitimacy to a more in-depth, rigorous scholarly assessment of a large region of the United States that has largely been overlooked by scholars. The essays discuss facets of midwestern life worth examining more deeply, including history, religion, geography, art, race, culture, and politics, and are written by well-known scholars in the field such as Michael Allen, Jon Butler, and Nicole Etcheson.
Book Synopsis Imagining the Heartland by : Britt E. Halvorson
Download or read book Imagining the Heartland written by Britt E. Halvorson and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2022-05-18 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Introduction -- The Midwest and white virtue -- Heartland histories -- Inside out : the global production of insular whiteness -- No place like home : the "ordinary" Midwest through popular fiction and fantasy -- Theater of whitness : mass media discourses on the Midwest region -- Conclusion -- Appendix A : bibliography of films referenced in chapter 4 -- Appendix B : bibliography of media articles referenced in chapter 5.
Author :Lea Rosson DeLong Publisher :Brunnier Art Museum University Art Museums Iowa State Univer ISBN 13 : Total Pages :280 pages Book Rating :4.:/5 (8 download)
Book Synopsis Grant Wood's Main Street by : Lea Rosson DeLong
Download or read book Grant Wood's Main Street written by Lea Rosson DeLong and published by Brunnier Art Museum University Art Museums Iowa State Univer. This book was released on 2004 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Good Country written by Jon K. Lauck and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2022-11-21 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the center of American history is a hole—a gap where some scholars’ indifference or disdain has too long stood in for the true story of the American Midwest. A first-ever chronicle of the Midwest’s formative century, The Good Country restores this American heartland to its central place in the nation’s history. Jon K. Lauck, the premier historian of the region, puts midwestern “squares” center stage—an unorthodox approach that leads to surprising conclusions. The American Midwest, in Lauck’s cogent account, was the most democratically advanced place in the world during the nineteenth century. The Good Country describes a rich civic culture that prized education, literature, libraries, and the arts; developed a stable social order grounded in Victorian norms, republican virtue, and Christian teachings; and generally put democratic ideals into practice to a greater extent than any nation to date. The outbreak of the Civil War and the fight against the slaveholding South only deepened the Midwest’s dedication to advancing a democratic culture and solidified its regional identity. The “good country” was, of course, not the “perfect country,” and Lauck devotes a chapter to the question of race in the Midwest, finding early examples of overt racism but also discovering a steady march toward racial progress. He also finds many instances of modest reforms enacted through the democratic process and designed to address particular social problems, as well as significant advances for women, who were active in civic affairs and took advantage of the Midwest’s openness to women in higher education. Lauck reaches his conclusions through a measured analysis that weighs historical achievements and injustices, rejects the acrimonious tones of the culture wars, and seeks a new historical discourse grounded in fair readings of the American past. In a trying time of contested politics and culture, his book locates a middle ground, fittingly, in the center of the country.
Book Synopsis German and Irish Immigrants in the Midwestern United States, 1850–1900 by : Regina Donlon
Download or read book German and Irish Immigrants in the Midwestern United States, 1850–1900 written by Regina Donlon and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-06-29 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the second half of the nineteenth century, hundreds of thousands of German and Irish immigrants left Europe for the United States. Many settled in the Northeast, but some boarded trains and made their way west. Focusing on the cities of Fort Wayne, Indiana and St Louis, Missouri, Regina Donlon employs comparative and transnational methodologies in order to trace their journeys from arrival through their emergence as cultural, social and political forces in their communities. Drawing comparisons between large, industrial St Louis and small, established Fort Wayne and between the different communities which took root there, Donlon offers new insights into the factors which shaped their experiences—including the impact of city size on the preservation of ethnic identity, the contrasting concerns of the German and Irish Catholic churches and the roles of women as social innovators. This unique multi-ethnic approach illuminates overlooked dimensions of the immigrant experience in the American Midwest.
Download or read book The Lost Region written by Jon Lauck and published by University of Iowa Press. This book was released on 2013-12 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In comparison to the South, the far West, and New England, the Midwest's history has been sadly neglected. The Lost Region demonstrates the regions importance, the depth of historical work once written about it, and the lessons that can be learned from some of its prominent historians, all with the intent of once again finding the forgotten center of the nation and developing a robust historiography of the Midwest. Book jacket.
