“Just the Status Quo?”

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 305-313
Author(s):  
Michele Mitchell
Keyword(s):  
Progressive Era ◽  
Documentary Film ◽  
Gilded Age ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Gender And Sexuality ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
The Status ◽  
Sex And Sexuality ◽  
Late Nineteenth

Abstract*As much as recent scholarship, popular outlets, and even a documentary film have asserted that we find ourselves in another “Gilded Age” since the 1980s, such a conceit has its limits. Indeed, we should proceed with caution when it comes to embracing analogies that posit a “new” or “second” Gilded Age. We might instead profitably think about the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as being a period of high capitalism and our current moment as reflecting a particular, if not peculiar, phase of capitalism. And, as much as our understanding of gender and sexuality during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries might actually be hindered by separating “Gilded Age” and “Progressive Era,” considering gendered dynamics of our current moment—a moment that has been termed late-stage capitalism—deepens our analysis of the low-wage economy. When it comes to sexuality, we should be careful in drawing parallels between the Gilded Age and the present given that contemporary understandings of sexuality began to coalesce during the late nineteenth century. Still, debates about sex and sexuality certainly shaped the Gilded Age and they continue to inform our current moment in dynamic and even unprecedented ways. We might not find ourselves in another Gilded Age, but we should arguably build upon current interest in histories of capitalism as a means think about the significance of progressive social movements within capitalist societies.

Politics, Social Movements, and the Periodization of U.S. History

2009 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 461-473 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Edwards
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Progressive Era ◽  
Gilded Age ◽  
Recent Literature ◽  
Mark Twain ◽  
The United States ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Considerable Doubt

It may be perilous for a member of the Society of Historians of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era to propose, in the Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, that we cease using the term “Gilded Age” as a label for the late nineteenth century. Since I admire Mark Twain, who famously coined the term in a novel that he cowrote with Charles Dudley Warner, such a suggestion feels disloyal if not downright un-American. But in struggling recently to write a synthesis of the United States between 1865 and 1905 (cutoff dates that I chose with considerable doubt), it became apparent to me that “Gilded Age” is not a very useful or accurate term. Intended as an indictment of the elite, it captures none of the era's grassroots ferment and little of its social and intellectual complexity. A review of recent literature suggests that periodizing schemes are now in flux, and a reconsideration may be in order.

scholarly journals Betwixt and Between: How Male and Female Audiences Engaged with the "Magnetic Girl" to Complicate Fin-de-Siècle Gender Roles

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Lowry
Keyword(s):  
Gender Identity ◽  
Gilded Age ◽  
Social Power ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Cultural Transition ◽  
Social Hierarchies ◽  
Physical Strength ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Individual

Lulu Hurst was a young Gilded Age-era performer known for her demonstrations of uncanny physical strength. For the most part, Hurst’s performance involved challenging an audience member to wrest objects from her grasp. For a member of Hurst's predominantly male audience, matching her strength to his own was a means by which to prove his masculinity to his peers. The notion of masculinity being on trial was particularly significant in the late nineteenth century--a time when women were beginning to gain social power.  Elaine Showalter famously describes this period as being characterized by a "battle within the sexes" as well as between them (9). As such, I argue that Hurst’s “demonstrations of strength” are best understood within the context of what Marvin Carlson terms "resistant performance"--that is, a performance that subverts the status quo by exposing its underlying assumptions. Drawing on Victor Turner’s work on ritual and liminality, I argue that when the individual male agent separates himself from his peers in order to challenge Hurst, his gender identity temporarily becomes destabilized. However, while Hurst may have disrupted the status quo by troubling gender binaries, her performance also served to reify existing social hierarchies. This paradox is both a marker of resistant performance and of social change. For the postmodern reader, Hurst's performance is significant in that her demonstrations reveal the implications of resistant performance during a unique period of cultural transition in which gender identity was called into question. 

Dialectics of Sovereignty, Compromise, and Equality in the Discourse on the “Tibetan Question”

boundary 2 ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 153-179
Author(s):  
Tsering Wangmo Dhompa
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Chinese Government ◽  
Real Solution ◽  
The Status ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Cultural Project ◽  
East And West ◽  
Hearts And Minds

Since 1950, the Chinese government has determined the status and position of Tibetans, but it has not won the battle for Tibetans’ hearts and minds. Ongoing Tibetan resistance under Chinese rule points to serious fissures in the Chinese state’s ideological and cultural project of “liberating” Tibet. Wang Hui’s article “The ‘Tibetan Question’ East and West: Orientalism, Regional Ethnic Autonomy, and the Politics of Dignity” analyzes the March 2008 “riots” in and around Lhasa in order to understand the impediments to a real solution to the crisis in Tibet. This piece suggests that although Wang Hui offers productive ways of moving beyond the status quo, his analysis of Tibet is limited by multiple ideological contradictions that ultimately fail to lift Tibet out of the advanced/backward binary that typifies late nineteenth-century orientalism.

Reimagining the “Lost Men” of the Gilded Age: Perspectives on the Late Nineteenth Century Presidents

2002 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 225-257 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles W. Calhoun
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Progressive Era ◽  
Gilded Age ◽  
Bright Light ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
The Past ◽  
Dark Ages ◽  
Late Nineteenth

For much of the twentieth century, scholars treated the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era as starkly contrasting phases in the unfolding of the American story: the post-Civil War dark ages followed by the bright light of the early twentieth century. More recently, historians have recognized the oversimplification if not downright wrongheadedness of that dichotomy. The past few decades have witnessed an explosion of studies on a variety of topics with coverage dates roughly from the 1870s to the 1920s. Most of these newer works underscore the continuities between the two periods and the relatively seamless evolution of forces and institutions.

Thoughts on Periodizing the Gilded Age: Capital Accumulation, Society, and Politics, 1873-1898

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 189-224 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Schneirov
Keyword(s):  
Cultural History ◽  
Progressive Era ◽  
Capital Accumulation ◽  
Gilded Age ◽  
Modernization Theory ◽  
Recent Past ◽  
Business Corporation ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
Scholarly Discussion ◽  
Late Nineteenth

There was once a time in the not too recent past when scholarly discussion and debate over periodization was central to the task of writing and thinking about the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. Scholars such as Richard Hofstadter, Robert Wiebe, and Samuel P. Hays applied versions of modernization theory to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to produce what came to be known as the “organizational synthesis.” A competing periodization centered on the rise of the large business corporation appeared in works by Martin Sklar, James Weinstein, and James Livingston. Since the 1970s, however, the new social and cultural history has introduced a multitude of new fields and perspectives. By the 1980s, the perceived fragmentation of history had generated an appeal for “synthesis.” In 1986 Thomas Bender called for new and intelligible narrative plots that would transcend “recent scholarship with its intensive specialization, fragmentation, and preoccupation with groups.” Yet, since then, occasional attempts to synthesize have been stillborn, and for the Gilded Age as well as for the Progressive Era the search for synthesis seems to have reached a cul-de-sac with no exit in sight.

scholarly journals A Congregação do Santíssimo Redentor em Goiás (1894-1925)

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 43
Author(s):  
Andréia Márcia de Castro Galvão
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
The State ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
The Status ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Legislative Changes ◽  
New Strategies ◽  
The Catholic Church

As mudanças legislativas do final do século XIX alteraram o status quo da Igreja Católica, levando-a a desenvolver novas estratégias de ação a fim de defender seu espaço junto à comunidade. Devido a séculos de padroado, a religiosidade brasileira tornara-se uma mescla de práticas medievais e mágicas com características portuguesas, africanas e indígenas. O combate a essas práticas foi intensificado com a implementação do ultramontanismo, que buscava centralizar e verticalizar o poder clerical, diminuir o poder das irmandades leigas, sacralizar os locais de culto, dentre outras. Partindo dessas premissas, esse artigo analisa a vinda de religiosos católicos europeus para Goiás, nomeadamente da Congregação do Santíssimo Redentor – redentoristas –, como parte importante do projeto ultramontano. Esses religiosos reforçaram o clero (então diminuto), contribuíram na propagação da fé com missões, giros paroquiais e desobrigas, criaram um jornal religioso e ainda ajudaram no controle da principal festa religiosa do estado. The Congregation of the Holy Redeemer in Goiás (1894-1925) The legislative changes of the late nineteenth century has altered the status quo of the Catholic Church, leading it to develop new strategies of action in order to defend its space with the community. Due to centuries of patronage, Brazilian religiosity had become a mixture of medieval and magical practices with Portuguese, African and indigenous characteristics. The fight against these practices was intensified with the implementation of ultramontanism, which sought to centralize and verticalize clerical power, to reduce the power of lay brotherhoods, to sacralize places of worship, among others. Based on these premises, this article analyzes the coming of European Catholic religious to Goiás, namely the Congregation of the Holy Redeemer – Redemptorists – as an important part of the ultramontane project. These religious strengthened the clergy (then scanty), contributed to the spread of the faith with missions, parochial circuit and disengagement, created a religious newspaper and also helped control the main religious celebration of the state.

A People's History of Baseball

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mitchell Nathanson
Keyword(s):  
Double Standard ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Nineteenth Century America ◽  
Black Player ◽  
Racial Barriers ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
National League ◽  
Late Nineteenth

Baseball is much more than the national pastime. It has become an emblem of America itself. Stories abound that illustrate baseball's significance in eradicating racial barriers, bringing neighborhoods together, and building civic pride. This book probes the less well-known but no less meaningful other side of baseball: episodes not involving equality, patriotism, heroism, and virtuous capitalism, but power—how it is obtained, and how it perpetuates itself. Exploring the founding of the National League, the book focuses on the newer Americans who sought club ownership to promote their own social status in the increasingly closed caste of late nineteenth-century America. The book's perspective on the rise and public rebuke of the Players Association shows that these events reflect both the collective spirit of working and middle-class America in the mid-twentieth century as well as the countervailing forces that sought to beat back this emerging movement that threatened the status quo. Even his take on baseball's racial integration that began with Branch Rickey's “Great Experiment” reveals the debilitating effects of the harsh double standard that resulted, requiring a black player to have unimpeachable character merely to take the field in a Major League game, a standard no white player was required to meet. Told with passion and occasional outrage, this book challenges the perspective of the well-known, deeply entrenched, hyper-patriotic stories of baseball and offers an incisive alternative history of America's much-loved national pastime.

Staking out an inshore commons: Pound-netting in Gilded Age America

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-15
Author(s):  
David Ress
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Fish Species ◽  
Gilded Age ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Important Food ◽  
The Commons ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Over Exploitation ◽  
Specific Part

Controversy over the expansion of pound netting in the largest US fisheries of the late nineteenth century marked an early conflict between those who considered fisheries a commons and those who sought to establish property rights in a fishery. Pound-netters physically staked out a specific part of the sea for their exclusive use, and their conception of their property rights resulted in significant overfishing of important food – and oil – fish species. Here, just as with the commons that many economists argue inevitably result in over-exploitation of a resource, regulation was rebuffed and the fisheries collapsed.

scholarly journals The Interlocking Processes Constraining the Struggle for Sanctuary in the Trump Era: The Case of La Puente, CA

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 155
Author(s):  
Gilda L. Ochoa
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
City Council ◽  
Gender And Sexuality ◽  
People Of Color ◽  
Transformative Change ◽  
Cautionary Tale ◽  
Community Members ◽  
White Supremacist ◽  
The Status ◽  
The City

By 10 January 2017, activists in the predominately Latina/o working class city of La Puente, California had lobbied the council to declare the city a sanctuary supporting immigrants, people of color, Muslims, LGBTQ people, and people with disabilities. The same community members urged the school district to declare itself a sanctuary. While community members rejoiced in pushing elected officials to pass these inclusive resolutions, there were multiple roadblocks reducing the potential for more substantive change. Drawing on city council and school board meetings, resolutions and my own involvement in this sanctuary struggle, I focus on a continuum of three overlapping and interlocking manifestations of white supremacist heteronormative patriarchy: neoliberal diversity discourses, institutionalized policies, and a re-emergence of high-profiled white supremacist activities. Together, these dynamics minimized, contained and absorbed community activism and possibilities of change. They reinforced the status quo by maintaining limits on who belongs and sustaining intersecting hierarchies of race, immigration status, gender, and sexuality. This extended case adds to the scant scholarship on the current sanctuary struggles, including among immigration scholars. It also illustrates how the state co-opts and marginalizes movement language, ideas, and people, providing a cautionary tale about the forces that restrict more transformative change.

scholarly journals ‘He came to her bed pretending courtship’: sex, courtship and the making of marriage in Ulster, 1750–1844

2018 ◽  
Vol 42 (162) ◽  
pp. 244-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leanne Calvert
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Sexual Activity ◽  
Sexual Intercourse ◽  
Sexual Practices ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Presbyterian Church ◽  
Sex And Sexuality ◽  
History Of ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
Formed Part

AbstractThe history of sex and sexuality is underdeveloped in Irish historical studies, particularly for the period before the late-nineteenth century. While much has been written on rates of illegitimacy in Ireland, and its regional diversity, little research has been conducted on how ordinary women and men viewed sex and sexuality. Moreover, we still know little about the roles that sex played in the rituals of courtship and marriage. Drawing on a sample of Presbyterian church records, this article offers some new insights into these areas. It argues that sexual intercourse and other forms of sexual activity formed part of the normal courtship rituals for many young Presbyterian couples in Ulster. Courting couples participated in non-penetrative sexual practices, such as petting, groping and bundling. Furthermore, while sexual intercourse did not have a place in the formal route to marriage, many couples engaged in it regardless.

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