Becoming America: The Revolution before 1776 / Edition 1

by Jon Butler

Overview

Winner of the John G. Cawelti Award, Popular Culture Association and American Culture Association

“We must congratulate Butler for [bringing] under control [a] profusion of scholarship and [making] sense of it in fewer than 250 pages. His book is a tour de force…Compelling and readable.”—Gordon S. Wood, New Republic

“Americans today think of the colonial period, if at all, as a time remote from modern America, in which society was unimaginably different from ours. Butler argues persuasively that America during the late colonial period…displayed distinctive traits of modern America, among them vigorous religious pluralism, bewildering ethnic diversity, tremendous inequalities of wealth, and a materialistic society with pervasively commercial values.”—Kirkus Reviews

Multinational, profit-driven, materialistic, power-hungry, religiously plural: America today—and three hundred years ago. Jon Butler’s panoramic view of the mainland American colonies after 1680 transforms our customary picture of pre-Revolutionary America; it reveals a strikingly “modern“ character that belies the eighteenth-century quaintness fixed in history. Stressing the middle and late decades (the hitherto “dark ages”) of the American colonial experience, Butler shows us vast revolutionary changes in a society that, for ninety years before 1776, was already becoming America.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674006676
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	12/28/2001
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Jon Butler is Howard R. Lamar Emeritus Professor of American Studies, History, and Religious Studies at Yale University and Research Professor of History at the University of Minnesota. His books include the Los Angeles Times bestseller Becoming America and the prizewinning Awash in a Sea of Faith and The Huguenots in America. He is a past president of the Organization of American Historians.

Table of Contents

	Introduction	1
1	Peoples	8
2	Economy	50
3	Politics	89
4	Things Material	131
5	Things Spiritual	185
6	1776	225
	Notes	251
	Acknowledgments	312
	Index	315

What People are Saying About This

In yet another provocative challenge to the conventional wisdom, Jon Butler argues for the 'modernity' of eighteenth-century America. He provides a lively and readable account of how transatlantic commerce, participatory politics, religious pluralism, and ethnic and racial diversity put colonials on the path to 'becoming Americans' during the decades before the Revolution.

Gary B. Mash

From the hand of one of our finest early American historians, this book beautifully conveys the texture of a colonial society thoroughly transformed from the late seventeenth century to the eve of the American Revolution. Bristling with lively vignettes of everyday life, Becoming America is especially illuminating in charting the changes in 'things material' and 'things spiritual'.
—Gary B. Mash, author of The Urban Crucible

Gloria Main

What a pleasure to read Becoming America! This fresh new synthesis of American society in the near - century before independence is concise and compelling. Butler's discussion of material culture is the very best out there. A wonderfully original, clear-headed book.
—Gloria Main, author of Tobacco Colony

Philip Morgan

Becoming America brilliantly synthesizes an enormous scholarly literature on North America's long eighteenth century. Jon Butler provides fresh and provocative insights into everything from demography to material culture. His book is a tour de force.
—Philip Morgan, author of Slave Counterpoint

Editorial Reviews

In yet another provocative challenge to the conventional wisdom, Jon Butler argues for the ‘modernity’ of eighteenth-century America. He provides a lively and readable account of how transatlantic commerce, participatory politics, religious pluralism, and ethnic and racial diversity put colonials on the path to ‘becoming Americans’ during the decades before the Revolution.

Christine Heyrman

An engrossing, important book. It promises to provoke and inspire. Jon Butler’s Becoming America is an ambitious examination of Britain’s mainland North American colonies between 1680 and 1770. The scope of the book is really quite broad; it covers nearly a century of development across thirteen widely varying colonies, and considers six formidably large aspects of early American life: migration and settlement, politics, economics, religion, the material world, and the origins of the Revolution. Butler’s book revolves around, and advances, a coherent, critical thesis: that ‘the vast social, economic, political, and cultural changes’ of this period created a distinctively ‘American’ society.’ The surprise of the book is that this society was modern; indeed, as Butler claims, it was the world’s ‘first modern society.’ The world Butler portrays in his often vivid, and always highly readable prose is an America of fantastic diversity, an America of many languages, different customs, and dissenting practices of piety. Butler’s Becoming America is a world of bustling politics and economic revolutions.

Jill Lepore

We must congratulate Butler for [bringing] under control [a] profusion of scholarship and [making] sense of it in fewer than 250 pages. His book is a tour de force… Compelling and readable.

New Republic - Gordon S. Wood

In Becoming America, Jon Butler examines the less examined period of American colonial history from 1680 to 1770 to argue that distinctive traits of modern America were already in place… The book makes a strong case for the early modernity of American society, helps to delineate the evolution of American identity, and serves as a good overview for the period.

Joel Hodsonn Studies International

Butler divides his approach to the period into well-studied categories before considering the implications for the Revolutionary era. His chapters on ‘Peoples,’ ‘Economy’ and ‘Politics’ provide a helpful synthesis of recent historiography without the tedious name dropping that characterizes so much historiographical literature… Butler will prompt us all to think more clearly about the structural relationships that evolved during these years.

Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography - John Ritchie Garrison

A terrific book, filled with human interest and the kind of detail that makes abstractions meaningful. A commendable weaving together of themes and materials from political history, social history, and cultural history. Butler offers us a firm foundation for further exploration.

Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

Writing in a deceptively simple style, Butler builds creatively on complex historiographical debates and masterfully synthesizes vast amounts of specialized research, both by himself and by others… Indeed, one of the book’s great virtues is its accessibility, and both its exclusively American focus and its stress on concrete social processes contribute to the clarity and forcefulness of the account. By all reasonable measures, this is a highly successful synthesis that manages to be at once enjoyable and provocative.

William & Mary Quarterly - Ruth H. Bloch

Butler divides his approach to the period into well-studied categories before considering the implications for the Revolutionary era. His chapters on 'Peoples, ' 'Economy' and 'Politics' provide a helpful synthesis of recent historiography without the tedious name dropping that characterizes so much historiographical literature... Butler will prompt us all to think more clearly about the structural relationships that evolved during these years.--John Ritchie Garrison "Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography"

In Becoming America, Jon Butler examines the less examined period of American colonial history from 1680 to 1770 to argue that distinctive traits of modern America were already in place... The book makes a strong case for the early modernity of American society, helps to delineate the evolution of American identity, and serves as a good overview for the period.--Joel Hodson "American Studies International"

In a thoughtful, erudite survey of colonial history, Butler traces the formation of many of America's modern social characteristics in the crucible of pre-Revolutionary society... Americans today think of the colonial period, if at all, as a time remote from modern America, in which society was unimaginably different from ours. Butler argues persuasively that America during the late colonial period (1680-1776) rapidly developed a variegated culture that displayed distinctive traits of modern America, among them vigorous religious pluralism, bewildering ethnic diversity, tremendous inequalities of wealth, and a materialistic society with pervasively commercial values... A sweeping, well-researched analysis of the transformative changes wrought by immigration, war, and cultural change in colonial America.-- "Kirkus Reviews"

The decades in between the Puritan-dominated 17th century and the market-revolutionizing early 19th century were a formative period, [Butler] suggests, during which a distinctly 'American' society--and, as Butler would have it, the first 'modern' society--developed... Butler's original analysis is important reading on 18th-century America; he shows that the colonies were developing distinct ways of spending, building, praying, decorating and politicking even then--a cultural revolution that anticipated the political revolution that was to follow.-- "Publishers Weekly"

We must congratulate Butler for [bringing] under control [a] profusion of scholarship and [making] sense of it in fewer than 250 pages. His book is a tour de force... Compelling and readable.--Gordon S. Wood "New Republic"

Writing in a deceptively simple style, Butler builds creatively on complex historiographical debates and masterfully synthesizes vast amounts of specialized research, both by himself and by others... Indeed, one of the book's great virtues is its accessibility, and both its exclusively American focus and its stress on concrete social processes contribute to the clarity and forcefulness of the account. By all reasonable measures, this is a highly successful synthesis that manages to be at once enjoyable and provocative.--Ruth H. Bloch "William & Mary Quarterly"

An engrossing, important book. It promises to provoke and inspire. Jon Butler's Becoming America is an ambitious examination of Britain's mainland North American colonies between 1680 and 1770. The scope of the book is really quite broad; it covers nearly a century of development across thirteen widely varying colonies, and considers six formidably large aspects of early American life: migration and settlement, politics, economics, religion, the material world, and the origins of the Revolution. Butler's book revolves around, and advances, a coherent, critical thesis: that 'the vast social, economic, political, and cultural changes' of this period created a distinctively 'American' society.' The surprise of the book is that this society was modern; indeed, as Butler claims, it was the world's 'first modern society.' The world Butler portrays in his often vivid, and always highly readable prose is an America of fantastic diversity, an America of many languages, different customs, and dissenting practices of piety. Butler's Becoming America is a world of bustling politics and economic revolutions.--Jill Lepore, Boston University

In yet another provocative challenge to the conventional wisdom, Jon Butler argues for the 'modernity' of eighteenth-century America. He provides a lively and readable account of how transatlantic commerce, participatory politics, religious pluralism, and ethnic and racial diversity put colonials on the path to 'becoming Americans' during the decades before the Revolution.--Christine Heyrman, author of Southern Cross: The Beginnings of the Bible Belt

A terrific book, filled with human interest and the kind of detail that makes abstractions meaningful. A commendable weaving together of themes and materials from political history, social history, and cultural history. Butler offers us a firm foundation for further exploration.--Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, Harvard University

From the Publisher

In Becoming America, Jon Butler examines the less examined period of American colonial history from 1680 to 1770 to argue that distinctive traits of modern America were already in place… The book makes a strong case for the early modernity of American society, helps to delineate the evolution of American identity, and serves as a good overview for the period.

American Studies International - Joel Hodson

Historians have often argued that the colonies became "Europeanized" in the century before the American Revolution, but in his latest book, Yale historian Butler (Awash in a Sea of Faith) contends that we need to pay close attention to this slice of early American history. The decades in between the Puritan-dominated 17th century and the market-revolutionizing early 19th century were a formative period, he suggests, during which a distinctly "American" society--and, as Butler would have it, the first "modern" society--developed. It was a culture "simultaneously aggressive and willful, materialistic as well as idealistic, driven toward authority and mastery." Butler examines the Americanizing process in the realms of politics, economics, religion and material culture. In the first chapter, "Peoples," Butler reminds readers that late colonial society was polyglot and diverse--including Germans, French, Scots, Ibo, Ashanti, Yoruba, Catawba and Leni-Lenape. The rest of the book is marked by Butler's characteristic innovation. Regarding politics, for instance, he suggests that Americans were no longer harmoniously self-governing through the town meeting; it was the colony itself, rather than the local microcosm, that was the center of political life. Likewise, distinctly American decorative arts began to develop during these years: after 1680, the relatively simple public buildings of the 17th century were "replaced by far larger, more elaborate facilities." Butler's original analysis is important reading on 18th-century America; he shows that the colonies were developing distinct ways of spending, building, praying, decorating and politicking even then--a cultural revolution that anticipated the political revolution that was to follow. B&w photos not seen by PW. (Apr.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

In a thoughtful, erudite survey of colonial history, Butler (Awash in a Sea of Faith, not reviewed) traces the formation of many of America's modern social characteristics in the crucible of pre-Revolutionary society. Americans today think of the colonial period, if at all, as a time remote from modern America, in which society was unimaginably different from ours. Butler argues persuasively that America during the late colonial period (1680-1776) rapidly developed a variegated culture that displayed distinctive traits of modern America, among them vigorous religious pluralism, bewildering ethnic diversity, tremendous inequalities of wealth, and a materialistic society with pervasively commercial values. Butler reviews the growth in population during this last half of the colonial period: while most settlers in 1680 were of English origin, by 1776 the British colonies were populated by a polyglot population of peoples from the British Isles, continental Europe, and Africa, as well as the indigenous Indian population. At the same time the population diversified and the economy changed in complex ways: the period saw such diverse developments as rapid growth in artisan and craft skills, the development of a large middle class, the growth of professional classes, widespread urbanization with attendant poverty, and the institutionalization of African slavery, formerly a sporadic practice not easily distinguishable from indentured servitude. The colonials developed democratic political institutions of surprising vigor, especially provincial and local assemblies, while royal governors were mostly irrelevant and sometimes incompetent. Frontier wars with France reinforced cultural andpoliticaldifferences with Britain while forging a sense of shared American nationhood that resulted in the Revolutionary movement. A sweeping, well-researched analysis of the transformative changes wrought by immigration, war, and cultural change in colonial America.

Kirkus Reviews