Promotions - Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles 2017 -

The English penchant for alcohol has fascinated generations of writers, poets, and social scientists. It has also confounded religious leaders, temperance advocates, and public health specialists. This interesting and ambitious book explores the English reputation for drinking over the past 500 years in order to answer basic questions about levels of alcohol consumption and the types of alcohol the English consume. More importantly, historian Jennings (Univ. of Bradford, UK) explores changing patterns of English drinking over the past five centuries by drawing on a variety of sources ranging from government statistics, medical reports, and ecclesiastical treatises to popular literature. Jennings also creatively incorporates alcohol studies research to produce a theoretically informed book that sheds new light on both the aberrant and normative functions of alcohol in English society. He skillfully examines how the social, symbolic, and ritual contexts of early English drinking practices shaped later attitudes toward alcohol. The role of alcohol at weddings, christenings, and funerals, for example, reveals deeper insights into the tensions that exist between continuity and change in English society. The emphasis on class and the gendered structures of pubs, alehouses, and other drinking spaces is also provocative and refreshing.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.

It is ironic that good, recent, comprehensive histories of Britain are so hard to find, when the minutiae of British history have provided topics for thousands of publications over the past 20 years. Campbell (Monmouth Univ.) addresses this scarcity splendidly in his clear and lively text, incorporating traditional and recent scholarship with a deft hand that avoids the burden of dry prose. In one section, the author explains that the geographic mobility traditionally considered one of the consequences of the 14th-century Black Death actually had begun before the outbreak of the epidemic, as had political discontent among the population, also traditionally attributed to the plague's aftermath. He points out that the psychological effects of the plague had a significant impact on the interdependence of survivors. Instead of loosening the bonds of community, the experience of the Black Death strengthened connections, even where people moved to other places, creating what Campbell refers to as "networks of village relationships." In essence, the Black Death only hastened changes that would have occurred eventually. Excellent.Summing Up: Essential. All levels/libraries.

Teachers and scholars of early modern England will rejoice at the publication of this book. Wrightson has joined with 17 others to describe how "English society became more defined, institutionally, ideologically and culturally" while it also "became more diversified regionally and socially." The book presents cutting-edge research by eminent scholars; the older approach that sought to chart the rise and fall of classes in early modern England has given way to a model that reflects the "cultural turn." Chapters are devoted to families, communities, "Reformations," education and literacy, authority and protest, and consumption and material culture. All authors emphasize the dynamism of early modern society and how its complexity makes it difficult to render firm judgments on any of these subjects. A good example is found in the chapter on household and family relationships: "Material interest, affection, practical considerations, influence of friends and family, parental love, honour, and personal piety, along with a miscellany of other intangibles, shaped marital choice." While the scholarship is impeccable, at times one wonders if some of the broad thematic essays adequately describe changes that occurred over a quarter of a millennium.Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

Fanning (Univ. College Dublin) builds on his background as a distinguished commentator, historian, biographer, and archivist to present an objective biography of a man both hated and loved. "Dev" is generally viewed abroad as the Irish Republic's equivalent of George Washington. But, unlike the 18th-century American statesman, Dev is little venerated at home. As in his lifetime, he continues to be treated as a distinctly partisan and contentious figure, the leader of a political faction that was and is still active in the nation's public affairs. It was not Dev's US citizenship, staunch patriotism as a senior officer in the rebel Easter Uprising, or his nascent love of power that protected him from the firing squad. Fanning details the circumstances of place, politics, a postponed trial, and anonymity that kept the British from wasting a bullet on him. The "luck of the Irish" and consummate political guile accompanied his political career of over five decades. This study, the best biography yet of the Irish statesman, is a succinct, judicious treatment of the basic facts of his life, his ideas, the controversies he generated, and his place not just in Irish but also world history.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.

Kirby (fellow, Trinity College, Cambridge) has produced an excellent study of historical writings from the Victorian and Edwardian eras, dissecting the ideas and biographical context of a small group of Church of England scholars, including Stubbs, Creighton, Green, Seeley, Freeman, Dixon, Figgis, and Cunningham. By focusing on religion and historical scholarship, Kirby examines "the complex relationship in the nineteenth and early twentieth century between religion and ideas, and the contexts in which they operated." Though Kirby's explanation of Anglican historiography occasionally proves difficult to access unless readers have a strong background in the development of the Anglican Church, the Oxford Movement, Catholic doctrine, early European history, and 19th-century historical practice, his analysis of the development of history as a discipline, particularly on the development of constitutionalism and socioeconomic history, is remarkable. Overall, the book deserves a central place in a historiography syllabus, as the wealth of materials consulted, the writing and organization of the work, and the analysis of the scholarship by amateurs and professionals from the era demonstrate a successful shaping of modern history. The footnotes, selected bibliography, and index are phenomenal.Summing Up: Essential. All academic levels/libraries.

The centennial of the Easter Rising in Dublin in 1916 led to numerous conferences, symposia, and publications. It is important to remember that the Rising resonated far outside Ireland; most strongly in nations of the Irish Diaspora. Among those nations the Irish in United States provided the most support, in all forms, leading up to the Rising. This volume brings together the work of two-dozen scholars to thoroughly explore American connections to this pivotal event in Irish and world history. Editor Grey has chosen the contributors and their assignments well. The early essays in the volume thoroughly discuss American involvement in Irish independence movements leading up to the Rising and continue through the aftermath of the Rising and its reception in Irish America. Among the many strengths of this outstanding book is its inclusive recognition of the full spectrum of Irish America, men and women, Catholics and Protestants who were not monolithic in their views at any time. Libraries that support undergraduate and graduate programs in immigration history as well as Irish and British history will find this a required book.Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

Long in need of substantial investigation, the Royal Navy's activities to check slavers and the slave trade after 1807 have now been addressed. Research in Admiralty and Foreign Office documents reveals dynamics of the quest by the British government to put an end to the inhuman traffic. The effort of officers and men in frigates, sloops, schooners, and brigs over a period of 60 years is a testament to the moral mission carried out in dogged fashion in the face of various difficulties, including climate and weather, hurricanes and other storms, dangerous cruising waters, and pestilential diseases, notably malaria and yellow fever. Retired Royal Navy officer Grindal explores the related domestic politics as well as the complex international relations. This was the Navy's least-known campaign. The bibliography supplements the calendar of primary sources used. Twenty-four illustrations and nine maps, plus a serviceable index, enhance this work. A list of suspected slave vessels detained is of inestimable value for future researchers, as is an appendix of treaties and conventions concerning slave-trade suppression in the Atlantic. Any student of the slave trade will benefit from this study, which takes a rightful place among works of outstanding historical literature.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

This history is stunningly relevant and beautifully written. Draining the fens, a massive wetland in eastern England, was one of the largest engineering projects in 17th-century Europe. It required large financial and political support at a time of nation building in England, gaining the full backing of the crown. Enterprising investors convinced society that the people of the fens needed to be transformed and that the land could become productive. Throwing inhabitants off their land and out of their social and economic patterns caused impassioned, even violent, protests. Importing Dutch technical expertise, extensive new drainage systems, including entirely new rivers, were constructed. However, the peat underlying most of the area subsided as it dried, leaving the drainage systems higher than the land around them and requiring further technical support and investment to keep it fertile and arable. Ultimately, the draining of the fens had huge ecological consequences that have only been recognized in recent times. This remarkable book is about nation building, economics, and environmental and social history. It is thoroughly researched, and historian Ash (Wayne State Univ.) tells his story in a compelling way that is accessible to any reader.Summing Up: Essential. All levels/libraries.

Hitchcock (Canterbury Christ Church Univ., UK) provides the first substantial investigation of vagrancy in English culture and society from 1650 to 1750, building on the groundbreaking scholarship of A.L. Beier, who examined rootlessness in England during the century previous (Masterless Men: The Vagrancy Problem in England 1560-1640, 1985). Hitchcock is to be commended for giving vivid voice to the most marginal and historically ephemeral of human populations. His work offers a highly readable and marvelously constructed social and cultural analysis of vagrancy grounded on a rich source base of royal proclamations, newspapers, pamphlets, court records, constabulary accounts, and popular ballads. The first half of the monograph explores the cultural construction of the vagrant, while the second gives a social history of vagrancy and subsistence mobility. Along the way, Hitchcock challenges a number of historiographic assumptions, namely, that contemporaries made clear-cut distinctions between vagrants and poor migrants; that English vagrancy declined in the decades following 1662; and that men constituted the vast body of vagrants in early modern England. This well-organized, highly accessible account will be of interest to all students of early modern culture, society, and gender.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.

Bates's monumental study of William the Conqueror, 15 years in the making, defines the author's career and readers' understanding of the character and influence of the 11th-century Norman's life. Bates (fellow, Univ. of East Anglia, UK) has a comprehensive knowledge of the primary sources for William's life, but what distinguishes this biography is how the author places that life convincingly in the context of its time, interpreted through a variety of recent theoretical approaches drawn from cultural history, anthropology, and related fields. Doing so allows Bates to bring William into sharper focus in terms of his performance of kingship, piety, masculinity, and other topics, and so to resolve (or at least suggest plausible resolutions of) the seeming contradictions in William's character that have challenged historians from as early as the 12th century. Above all, Bates brings a humanistic perspective to his task, assessing William not just in terms of the significance and impressiveness of his achievements but also with respect for "the silent voices of the thousands whose lives William the Conqueror ruined." The result is a joy to read, consistently illuminating, stimulating, and full of suggestions for further paths of research.Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates and above.