Monday, June 17, 2013
Wood and Morgan
Much of what I have been reading in section I. titles Monarchy of Wood's Radicalism of the American Revolution is a parallel history of what we read in Morgan's book. Although Morgan was looking at servitude to explain the paradox of slavery and freedom within America, Wood is using much of the same relationships and material dto develop this groundwork that indeed the society before the revolution was tied to Monarchy. A lot of histories write that the colonies were very distant from the monarchy in ideology and distance. However, Wood is turning this theory around. Why is he doing so? I assume it is to show the juxtaposition of the ideas of the revolution to prove that indeed it was radical. Too often the history of the U.S. is seen as a linear eventuality of a democratic system. However, the colonist were very much tied to nobility and the monarchy through patronage, authority, and titles.
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Alejandro,
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with your argument that Wood is trying to juxtapose American society prior to the Revolution to what existed after. In order for him to demonstrate how radical the Revolution actually was, he has to provide a baseline of what existed before. In addition, since he is wriring this for a larger audience, I think he needs to assume limited background knowledge. Therefore, prior to presenting the changes that took place, he must ensure that his readership has the same knowledge as he does. Thoughts?
Mark,
DeleteI agree that he is trying to create a baseline to establish his thesis. However, sometimes it feels that he goes out of his war to prove that American society was hierarchical. He has to include a lot of caveats.
If you agree with the premise that he is building this building block, then do you believe his argument that the colonies had a stronger hierarchy and link to monarchy than England, as Wood points out.
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