Transatlantic Subjects: Ideas, Institutions, and Social Experience in Post-Revolutionary British North America

by Nancy Christie

Overview

Transatlantic Subjects dissents from four decades of scholarly writing on colonial Canada by taking the British imperial context - rather than the North American environment - as a conceptual framework for interpreting patterns of social and cultural life in the colonies prior to the 1850s. Anchored in "the new British history" advanced by J.G.A. Pocock, David Armitage, and Kathleen Wilson, this collective work explores ideas, institutions, and social practices that were adapted and changed through the process of migration from the British archipelago to the new settlement societies. Contributors discuss a broad range of institutional and social practices, including education, religion, radical politics, and family life. Transatlantic Subjects offers a new perspective for the writing of Canada's history. A self-conscious response to the plea for a broader British history that includes the overseas settlement colonies, it makes a significant contribution to the new cultural history of the British Empire. Contributors include Bruce Curtis (Carleton), Michael Eamon (Queen's), Darren Ferry (McMaster), Donald Fyson (Laval), Michael Gauvreau (McMaster), Jeffrey McNairn (Queen's), Bryan Palmer (Queen's), J.G.A. Pocock (Johns Hopkins), Michelle Vosburgh (Brock), Todd Webb (Laurentian), and Brian Young (McGill)."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780773578609
Publisher:	McGill-Queens University Press
Publication date:	02/08/2008
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	496
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Nancy Christie is professor, history, Trent University and the author of several prize-winning books, including A Full-Orbed Christianity: The Protestant Churches and Social Welfare in Canada, 1900-1940, and Engendering the State: Family, Work, and Welfa

Table of Contents

Foreword J.G.A. Pocock vii

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction: Theorizing a Colonial Past: Canada as a Society of British Settlement Nancy Christie 3

Part 1 Agrarian Patriots

The Canadiens and British Institutions of Local Governance in Quebec from the Conquest to the Rebellions Donald Fyson 45

"The Plague of Servants": Female Household Labour and the Making of Classes in Upper Canada Nancy Christie 83

Revisiting Feudal Vestiges in Urban Quebec Brian Young 133

Part 2 Provincial Britons

How the Canadian Methodists Became British: Unity, Schism, and Transatlantic Identity, 1827-54 Todd Webb 159

The Dividends of Empire: Church Establishments and Contested British Identities in the Canadas and the Maritimes, 1780-1850 Michael Gauvreau 199

Monitorial Schooling, "Common Christianity," and Politics: A Transatlantic Controversy Bruce Curtis 251

Part 3 A Laboratory of Modernity

Scottish-Trained Medical Practitioners in British North America and Their Participation in a Transatlantic Culture of Enlightenment Michael Eamon 283

The Malthusian Moment: British Travellers and the Vindication of Economic Liberalism in the Maritime Countryside Jeffrey L. McNairn 329

"Deserving of Favourable Consideration": Crown Land Agents, Surveyours, and Access to Crown Lands in Upper Canada Michelle Vosburgh 369

Popular Radicalism and the Theatrics of Rebellion: The Hybrid Discourse of Dissent in Upper Canada in the 1830s Bryan Palmer 403

"The Original Idea Has Been Considerably Amplified": Culture, Authority, and the Emergence of a Liberal Social Order in the Central Canadian Mechanics' Institute Movement, 1828-60 Darren Ferry 439

Contributors475