Huck’s Raft

The Learning-Centered University

Making College a More Developmental, Transformational, and Equitable Experience

Steven Mintz

"This work discusses how colleges are failing students and how we can address this issue"--

The Prime of Life

A History of Modern Adulthood

Steven Mintz

Steven Mintz reconstructs the emotional interior of a life stage too often relegated to self-help books and domestic melodramas. He describes the challenges of adulthood today and puts them into perspective by exploring how past generations achieved intimacy and connection, raised children, sought meaning in work, and responded to loss.

A Prison of Expectations

The Family in Victorian Culture

Steven Mintz

The stereotypical Victorian family, although represented in innumerable daguerrotypes, is as much fantasy as reality. The Victorian family took many forms, and in this ambitious and highly original book, Steven Mintz enters five different homes in order to shed light on critical aspects of middle-class character and family during the era. By investigating the private lives of five of the most famous and influential novelists—Robert Louis Stevenson, George Eliot, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Catharine Sedgwick, and Samuel Butler—Mintz traces patterns of intersection between family dynamics and larger cultural problems of authority, legitimacy, and discipline in nineteenth-century Britain and America. More specifically, he explores the struggles to achieve a personal independence within a Victorian home and the larger historical struggle to adapt the older traditions of deference, authority, and responsibility to the emerging realities of a democratic age.

Huck’s Raft

A History of American Childhood

Steven Mintz

Like Huck’s raft, the experience of American childhood has been both adventurous and terrifying. For more than three centuries, adults have agonized over raising children while children have followed their own paths to development and expression. Now, Steven Mintz gives us the first comprehensive history of American childhood encompassing both the child’s and the adult’s tumultuous early years of life. Underscoring diversity through time and across regions, Mintz traces the transformation of children from the sinful creatures perceived by Puritans to the productive workers of nineteenth-century farms and factories, from the cosseted cherubs of the Victorian era to the confident consumers of our own. He explores their role in revolutionary upheaval, westward expansion, industrial growth, wartime mobilization, and the modern welfare state. Revealing the harsh realities of children’s lives through history—the rigors of physical labor, the fear of chronic ailments, the heartbreak of premature death—he also acknowledges the freedom children once possessed to discover their world as well as themselves. Whether at work or play, at home or school, the transition from childhood to adulthood has required generations of Americans to tackle tremendously difficult challenges. Today, adults impose ever-increasing demands on the young for self-discipline, cognitive development, and academic achievement, even as the influence of the mass media and consumer culture has grown. With a nod to the past, Mintz revisits an alternative to the goal-driven realities of contemporary childhood. An odyssey of psychological self-discovery and growth, this book suggests a vision of childhood that embraces risk and freedom—like the daring adventure on Huck’s raft.

America and Its Peoples

A Mosaic in the Making

James Kirby Martin, Steven Mintz

For PowerBuilder, PowerJ and PowerSite developers, the DataWindow object offers remarkable power -- and most developers have only scratched the surface of what it can do. Part reference, part tutorial, The Definitive DataWindow is the most systematic guide to the DataWindow every written -- covering everything from the basics to the most advanced skills and techniques. Leading PowerBuilder developer Richard Brooks begins with an in-depth look at the relationships between DataWindows, relational databases, and SQL -- demonstrating powerful techniques for returning data to applications more quickly and efficiently. Brooks reviews the Database Painter, showing how to automate interface conventions company-wide; then introduces the DataWindows control, in-depth. Readers will master every option and characteristic available to DataWindow developers; the strengths and weaknesses of each type of DataWindow; and much more. The Definitive DataWindow includes detailed coverage of graphing, edit and formatting masks, object-oriented techniques for creating specialized DataWindows, and hundreds of advanced tips and techniques, many never before published.

Domestic Revolutions

A Social History Of American Family Life

Steven Mintz, Susan Kellogg

An examination of how the concept of “family” has been transformed over the last three centuries in the U.S., from its function as primary social unit to today’s still-evolving model. Based on a wide reading of letters, diaries and other contemporary documents, Mintz, an historian, and Kellogg, an anthropologist, examine the changing definition of “family” in the United States over the course of the last three centuries, beginning with the modified European model of the earliest settlers. From there they survey the changes in the families of whites (working class, immigrants, and middle class) and blacks (slave and free) since the Colonial years, and identify four deep changes in family structure and ideology: the democratic family, the companionate family, the family of the 1950s, and lastly, the family of the '80s, vulnerable to societal changes but still holding together.

The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1941-1947

John Lewis Gaddis

This book moves beyond the focus on economic considerations that was central to the work of New Left historians, examining the many other forces--domestic politics, bureaucratic inertia, quirks of personality, and perceptions of Soviet intentions--that influenced key decision makers in Washington.

Understanding Emerson

"The American Scholar" and His Struggle for Self-reliance

Kenneth Sacks

Publisher Description

American Sphinx

The Character of Thomas Jefferson

Joseph J. Ellis

Offers a reassessment of the life, image, and career of Thomas Jefferson, examining his complex personality, controversies about the man and his beliefs, and his accomplishments.

The Wages of Whiteness

Race and the Making of the American Working Class

David R. Roediger

THE WAGES OF WHITENESS provides an original study of the formative years of working-class racism in the United States. In an Afterword to this second edition, Roediger discusses recent studies of whiteness and the changing face of labor itself--then surveys criticism of his work. He accepts the views of some critics but challenges others.

The First Casualty

The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth-Maker from the Crimea to Iraq

Phillip Knightley

"The first casualty when war comes, is truth," said American Senator Hiram Johnson in 1917. In his gripping, now-classic history of war journalism, Phillip Knightley shows just how right Johnson was. From William Howard Russell, who described the appalling conditions of the Crimean War in the Times of London, to the ranks of reporters, photographers, and cameramen who captured the realities of war in Vietnam, The First Casualty tells a fascinating story of heroism and collusion, censorship and suppression. Since Vietnam, Knightley reveals, governments have become much more adept at managing the media, as highlighted in chapters on the Falklands War, the Gulf War, and the conflict between NATO and Serbia over Kosovo. And in a new chapter on the post-9/11 wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Knightley details even greater degrees of government manipulation and media complicity, as evidenced by the "embedding" of reporters in military units and the uncritical, openly patriotic coverage of these conflicts. "The age of the war correspondent as hero," he concludes, "appears to be over." Fully updated, The First Casualty remains required reading for anyone concerned about freedom of the press, journalistic responsibility, and the nature of modern warfare.

Bitter Fruits of Bondage

The Demise of Slavery and the Collapse of the Confederacy, 1861-1865

Armstead L. Robinson

In this controversial history the author tells the story of how the Civil Warand slavery were intertwined, and how internal social conflict undermined theConfederacy in the end.

Age Norms and Intercultural Interaction in Colonial North America

Jason Eden, Naomi Eden

This interdisciplinary study examines how age norms shaped the experiences of Europeans, Native Americans, and African Americans in colonial North America, exploring how diverse population groups conceptualized the human life course and how they adhered to culturally specific sets of beliefs about the young and old. Utilizing evidence drawn from a variety of secondary and primary sources, the authors also show that, as various cultural groups interacted in colonial North America, their views of specific age cohorts evolved and clashed in important ways. Although age is a category of analysis often overlooked by scholars, this book demonstrates that it was pivotal for everyone who lived in early North America, including the various Native American tribes that inhabited the eastern part of the continent. It also addresses the different ways that European colonists experienced the human life course in three geopolitical regions: New England, the Middle Colonies, and the South. It further explains how age norms played a significant role in both the development of racialized slavery in North America and in relationships between Europeans and Native Americans. This study reveals that even within the uneven power dynamic often present during colonial encounters, African American and Native American attitudes and practices related to human aging proved resilient and influential. Overall, by examining how early Americans viewed and treated children, youths, and older adults, this book is one of the first to systematically explore the deep historical roots of age norms in territories that would eventually become a part of the United States. Many of the beliefs about human aging that emerged during the colonial period continue to shape approaches to childrearing, education, health care, and numerous other issues. Furthermore, this study—in addition to providing unique and valuable historical information—offers readers alternative ways of understanding and approaching the human life course, making it relevant to both policymakers and scholars working in a variety of fields.

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Mark Twain

'We said there warn't no home like a raft, after all. Other places do seem so cramped up and smothery, but a raft don't. You feel mighty free and easy and comfortable on a raft.'Huck Finn escapes from his alcoholic father by faking his own death and so begins his journey through the Deep South, seeking independence and freedom. On his travels, Huck meets an escaped slave, Jim, who is a wanted man, and together they journey down the Mississippi River. Raising the timeless and universal l issues of prejudice, bravery and hope, the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was and still is considered the great American novel.

Kids' TV Grows Up

The Path from Howdy Doody to SpongeBob

Jo Holz

In the early days of television, suburban families welcomed TV into their homes as an electronic babysitter that would also teach their children about the world. Children's programming soon came to play a key role in the development of mass culture, promoting the shared interests, norms and vocabulary through which children interact with peers and define themselves as a cohort. This social history examines the forces driving the development of children's television in the U.S., from its inception to the present. Analyses of iconic programs reveal how they influenced our concept of childhood.

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Illustrated)

Mark Twain

Refusing to be civilized by Southern society or cowed by his drunken father's lashings, young Huckleberry Finn decides he has only one option left: fake his own death and hop a raft down the Mississippi River. Instead of carrying him far from trouble, though, Huck's raft delivers him to a place of moral uncertainty.Mark Twain unwinds Huck's harrowing journey to manhood with satirical wit, revealing the troubled history of the American South, where slavery held sway long after the Civil War ended. Huck's relationship with runaway slave Jim forces him to confront his beliefs about friendship and freedom.

Modern Motherhood

An American History

Jodi Vandenberg-Daves

How did mothers transform from parents of secondary importance in the colonies to having their multiple and complex roles connected to the well-being of the nation? In the first comprehensive history of motherhood in the United States, Jodi Vandenberg-Daves explores how tensions over the maternal role have been part and parcel of the development of American society. Modern Motherhood travels through redefinitions of motherhood over time, as mothers encountered a growing cadre of medical and psychological experts, increased their labor force participation, gained the right to vote, agitated for more resources to perform their maternal duties, and demonstrated their vast resourcefulness in providing for and nurturing their families. Navigating rigid gender role prescriptions and a crescendo of mother-blame by the middle of the twentieth century, mothers continued to innovate new ways to combine labor force participation and domestic responsibilities. By the 1960s, they were poised to challenge male expertise, in areas ranging from welfare and abortion rights to childbirth practices and the confinement of women to maternal roles. In the twenty-first century, Americans continue to struggle with maternal contradictions, as we pit an idealized role for mothers in children’s development against the social and economic realities of privatized caregiving, a paltry public policy structure, and mothers’ extensive employment outside the home. Building on decades of scholarship and spanning a wide range of topics, Vandenberg-Daves tells an inclusive tale of African American, Native American, Asian American, working class, rural, and other hitherto ignored families, exploring sources ranging from sermons, medical advice, diaries and letters to the speeches of impassioned maternal activists. Chapter topics include: inventing a new role for mothers; contradictions of moral motherhood; medicalizing the maternal body; science, expertise, and advice to mothers; uplifting and controlling mothers; modern reproduction; mothers’ resilience and adaptation; the middle-class wife and mother; mother power and mother angst; and mothers’ changing lives and continuous caregiving. While the discussion has been part of all eras of American history, the discussion of the meaning of modern motherhood is far from over.

The New-York Journal of American History

Unknown author

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