“Most Fitting Companions”: Making Mixed-Race Bodies Visible in Antebellum Public Spaces

2015 ◽  
Vol 56 (2) ◽  
pp. 138-165
Author(s):  
Lisa Merrill
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Mixed Race ◽  
Public Spaces ◽  
Rhetorical Strategies ◽  
Crystal Palace ◽  
Social Scripts ◽  
Class Privilege ◽  
The U.S

In the years leading up to the U.S. Civil War, free and fugitive persons of color were aware of the need to frame how they were seen in their everyday lives as part of an arsenal of rhetorical strategies to attract audiences to the abolitionist cause. In this article, I examine three spatial contexts that nineteenth-century mixed-race persons navigated for abolitionist ends in which their hybrid bodies were featured as an aspect of their public performances. These locations—Britain's imperially sponsored Crystal Palace, a Brooklyn church pulpit, and the dramatic reader's lectern—were not merely static places but were spaces animated and made meaningful by the interactions performed therein. Each framed a particular ocular and locational politics and strategically imbued some degree of social class privilege on the hybrid persons following its social scripts. But in so doing, each setting also reinforced colorism and contributed to notions of the supremacy of “whiteness” even while it furthered an antislavery agenda.

Limbs

2019 ◽  
pp. 79-106
Author(s):  
Sarah Blackwood
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Racial Violence ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Inner Life ◽  
Mind And Body ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
The U.S

This chapter traces a new visual genealogy of inner life as it appears in canonical late-nineteenth-century painter and portraitist Thomas Eakins’s work. It situates Eakins’s lauded portraits alongside the complex political and racialized questions about mind and body that emerged in the U.S. after the Civil War. It centers a reading of a marginal Eakins painting—Whistling for Plover—that Eakins gave as a gift to neurologist S. Weir Mitchell. This painting is a part of a web of inventive thinking about mind and body in the postbellum U.S., evincing the deep anxiety felt nationally over the bodily scars left by the Civil War’s racial violence, an anxiety that is essential to the development of the New Psychology as a discipline.

Popular Narratives and Mestizo Horsemen: Creating a Racial Ideal in Nineteenth-Century Mexico, 1844–1896

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 352-381
Author(s):  
E. Mark Moreno
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Mixed Race ◽  
The United States ◽  
Archival Research ◽  
Mexican State ◽  
Popular Magazine ◽  
Print Publications

Between 1844 and 1896, two archetypal figures on horseback known as rancheros and chinacos were disseminated through print publications. As war with the United States loomed in 1844, a relatively obscure Mexican writer depicted the ranchero as a “true national type” in a popular magazine. Eighteen years later another archetype on horseback, the chinaco, appeared in newspaper propaganda designed to provoke resistance against an imminent French advance into the Mexican interior. Later writers, such as Justo Sierra and Antonio García Cubas, imbued such figures with racialized mestizo qualities and heroic martial traits, equating mestizo blood with strength and martial capabilities that could build a more advanced Mexican state. The depiction of both figures as of mixed-race origins was a popular perception that carried over into the Porfirian years. This article traces the origins of these figures in popular reading during the years in which Mexico dealt with war with the United States, a civil war, and finally the French Intervention. Through an analysis of popular reading and intellectual commentaries, supplemented by archival research, mestizaje as a foundational concept of Mexican nationhood is traced to these early depictions. Entre 1844 y 1896, las publicaciones impresas de México difundieron dos figuras arquetípicas a caballo, conocidas como rancheros y chinacos. Cuando se avecinaba la guerra con Estados Unidos, un oscuro escritor mexicano describió al ranchero como un “verdadero tipo nacional” en una revista popular. Dieciocho años más tarde, otro arquetipo a caballo, el chinaco, apareció en la propaganda periodística diseñada para incitar a la resistencia contra un inminente avance francés hacia el interior de México. Más adelante, escritores como Justo Sierra y Antonio García Cubas infundieron tales figuras con las cualidades racializadas del mestizo y los rasgos marciales heroicos, equiparando la sangre mestiza con la fuerza y las capacidades marciales necesarias para construir un Estado mexicano más avanzado. La representación de ambas figuras como mezcla de razas constituyó una percepción popular que se mantuvo durante los años del Porfiriato. El presente artículo rastrea los orígenes de estos dos arquetipos en las lecturas populares durante los años en que México libró una guerra contra Estados Unidos, una guerra civil y, finalmente, lidió con la intervención francesa. A través de un análisis de las lecturas populares y los comentarios intelectuales, complementado con una investigación de archivo, se rastrea el origen del mestizaje en cuanto concepto fundacional de la idea de nación mexicana hasta estas representaciones.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Aaron Sheehan-Dean
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Nation Building ◽  
State Building ◽  
Global View ◽  
Late Eighteenth ◽  
Common Problems ◽  
The U.S

In the mid-nineteenth century, a set of wars convulsed India, the U.S., Poland, and China. Although typically studied separately, the wars followed similar patterns and even responded to each other. This influence was felt most fully when powerful nations offered or withheld their support for insurgents, but it also operated in a more subtle fashion. The discussions about sovereignty, authority, and rebellion preoccupying literate observers created a global conversation that shaped the experiences of people engaged in widely different enterprises. Unlike the liberal wars of nation-building in the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries, these conflicts revolved around common problems of sovereignty and state-building. Participants at the time saw these connections and used references and analogies to other conflicts to advance their own interests. This global view restores the U.S. Civil War to its historical place as one of several insurgent challenges in the era.

scholarly journals Archeological Investigations for Fort Stabilization and Restoration, For McKavett State Historical Park, Menard County, Texas: 1978-1990 Seasons

1996 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Small Proportion ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Public Spaces ◽  
Architectural Features ◽  
Military Occupations ◽  
The Military ◽  
The Town ◽  
Limited Testing ◽  
The U.S

The U.S. Army occupations at Fort McKavett from 1853 until 1859 and from 1868 until 1883 were part of Texas's frontier defense. During the Civil War and from 1883 until the present, civilians have inhabited and used the fort buildings, creating the small town of Fort McKavett. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department developed part of the town as a state historical park, restoring this property to its appearance during the second military occupation. Archeological investigations at the park between 1978 and 1990 focused on recovering architectural data and artifacts to support restoration, stabilization, and interpretation of the military occupations. The archeological work varied from surface collection to large-scale excavations, the latter generally confined to Officers' Quarters 4, but the most common approach was limited testing in building foundations and suspected architectural features. Work took place in 16 structures. Most of the archeological work focused on officers' quarters, although a few enlisted mens' barracks and other buildings also were tested. Relatively few temporally diagnostic artifacts were recovered in the vicinity of walls, fireplaces, and other architectural features, and only sparse military and military-period artifacts were found. The 372 military and military-period artifacts recovered from the post-1977 work at Fort McKavett and described in this report represent less than 0.01 percent of the total artifact assemblage and likely represent only a small proportion of the trash generated by the military occupations. Much of that trash probably was disposed of and possibly burned off-site or, if on-site, in pit latrines or other deep features not excavated during the 1978-1990 work. Military conduct, discipline, and policing may have functioned in keeping public spaces at this frontier military fort relatively litter free and thus artifact poor.

The Judgments Begin

2020 ◽  
pp. 130-178
Author(s):  
Christopher James Blythe
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
American Civil War ◽  
Latter Day Saints ◽  
The U.S

This chapter focuses on the Utah territorial period—a time marked by hostility between the Latter-day Saints and the federal government. Throughout the latter half of the nineteenth century, Mormon visionaries deployed prophecies of Gentile invasions on the Saints, as well as judgments on the major cities of the nation. The assurance that God would intervene against their enemies’ aggressions offered catharsis to the anxieties brought on by the U.S. Army’s occupation of Utah during the 1850s, the Civil War, and federal enforcement of anti-polygamy laws—what became known as “the raid.” In addition to prophecies introduced among the laity, there was also, during this period, an emphasis on Joseph Smith’s prophecy of a future American civil war that circulated widely in Mormon and non-Mormon circles. Apocalypticism prospered as tensions festered between Mormons and the federal government.

Epilogue

Abolitionism ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 128-134
Author(s):  
Richard S. Newman
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Atlantic World ◽  
Lost Cause ◽  
American Slavery ◽  
War Memory ◽  
Civil War Memory ◽  
The U.S

In the final decades of the nineteenth century, American abolitionists began writing memoirs, histories, and reminiscences of the grand struggle for freedom. Part of a battle over Civil War memory, they sought not only to claim a piece of history but also to combat Lost Cause narratives that already denigrated emancipation. Even though American slavery was history, abolitionist battles continued. The epilogue describes how across the Atlantic world abolitionists realized that their struggle was not over. British abolitionists focused on the perils of illegal slave trading while Iberian and Latin American abolitionists renewed their struggle against bondage itself. In the U.S. South, abolitionists fought against new forms of discrimination that seemed very much like slavery.

scholarly journals The Crystal Palace, environmentally considered

2008 ◽  
Vol 12 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 283-294 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henrik Schoenefeldt
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Architectural Design ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Public Spaces ◽  
Temperate Climate ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Crystal Palace ◽  
Primary Object ◽  
Environmental Criteria ◽  
Clean Air

In the nineteenth century, horticulturists such as John Claudius Loudon and Joseph Paxton, aware of the new environmental possibilities of glasshouses that had been demonstrated in the context of horticulture, contemplated the use of fully-glazed structures as a means to creating new types of environments for human beings. While Loudon suggested the use of large glass structures to immerse entire Russian villages in an artificial climate, Henry Cole and Paxton envisioned large-scale winter parks, to function as new types of public spaces. These indoor public spaces were intended to grant the urban population of London access to clean air, daylight and a comfortable climate. Although glasshouses had only been experienced in the immediate context of horticulture, designed in accordance with the specific environmental requirements of foreign plants, rather than the requirements of human comfort and health, they were perceived as a precedent for a new approach to architectural design primarily driven by environmental criteria. The environmental design principles of horticulture were discussed extensively in nineteenth-century horticultural literature such Loudon's Remarks on the Construction of Hothouses (1817), Paxton's Magazine of Botany (1834-49) and the Transactions of the Horticultural Society of London (1812-44). Since the purpose of glasshouses was to facilitate the cultivation of an increasing variety of foreign plants in the temperate climate of Northern Europe, the creation of artificial climates tailored to the specific environmental needs of plants became the primary object of the design.

scholarly journals Bodies in the Archive

2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 124-134
Author(s):  
Nancy Cervetti
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Gunshot Wounds ◽  
Burning Pain ◽  
Medicine And Literature ◽  
International Reputation ◽  
Rattlesnake Venom ◽  
Rest Cure ◽  
Phantom Limbs ◽  
The U.S

Off and on for fifteen years I traveled the country to research the life and work of the nineteenth-century physician S. Weir Mitchell. Mitchell is best known as the creator of the rest cure to treat hysteria and neurasthenia, but his wide-ranging interests led him to explore many other areas of medicine and literature. His groundbreaking work with rattlesnake venom earned him an international reputation, and his work with gunshot wounds, burning pain, and phantom limbs during the U.S. Civil War won him the title of the “Father of American Neurology.” Mitchell also possessed an impressive facility with language, and . . .

The Decline of U.S. Whaling: Was the Stock of Whales Running Out?

1988 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 569-595 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lance E. Davis ◽  
Robert E. Gallman ◽  
Teresa D. Hutchins
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
War Of 1812 ◽  
Whaling Industry ◽  
The U.S ◽  
The Revolution

Re-emerging from the disruption caused by the Revolution and the War of 1812, the American whaling industry grew to dominate the seas between 1820 and 1860, only to suffer a severe decline during and after the Civil War. In the following article, Professors Davis, Gallman, and Hutchins examine the hypothesis that the U.S. whaling industry collapsed because the stock of whales was being depleted. After investigating the size of the original whale populations, their breeding habits, and the estimates of whales taken during the nineteenth century, the authors conclude that the overfishing of whales of various species occurred either not at all or too late to have been a contributing factor in America's whaling decline.

The Spanish Reception of Le Sacre du Printemps (1913–1936)

2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 48-66
Author(s):  
Idoia Murga Castro
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Spanish Civil War ◽  
Original Work ◽  
Silver Age ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Ballets Russes ◽  
Rite Of Spring ◽  
Le Sacre Du Printemps ◽  
Cultural Expansion

Centenary celebrations are being held between 2016 and 2018 to mark the first consecutive tours of Diaghilev's Ballets Russes in Spain. This study analyses the Spanish reception of Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring) (1913), one of its most avant-garde pieces. Although the original work was never performed in Spain as a complete ballet, its influence was felt deeply in the work of certain Spanish choreographers, composers, painters and intellectuals during the so-called Silver Age, the period of modernisation and cultural expansion which extended from the end of the nineteenth century to the beginning of the Spanish Civil War.

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