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Love and the Working Class: The Inner Worlds of Nineteenth Century Americans

Online ISBN:
9780197514252
Print ISBN:
9780197514221
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
Book

Love and the Working Class: The Inner Worlds of Nineteenth Century Americans

Karen Lystra
Karen Lystra
Professor of American Studies Emerita, California State University, Fullerton
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Published online:
30 April 2024
Published in print:
26 March 2024
Online ISBN:
9780197514252
Print ISBN:
9780197514221
Publisher:
Oxford University Press

Abstract

Based on over five thousand letters written by both Black and white working-class Americans in the period 1830–1880, Love and the Working Class features the personal expression of ordinary Americans as they find a mate, joke or boast about sex, argue with their spouse, and express their feelings of attachment in both prose and poetry. Most of the letter writers had no more than a third- or fourth-grade education, and some of them were illiterate. Yet they or their scribe took pen and pencil in hand, often sounding out words as they wrote. Readers can “hear” them speak to each other as they expressed their sense of intimacy within the collective relationships of their local community or tribe. Their sense of community included an almost universally accepted yet unspoken demand for racial homogeneity in courtship and marriage. Love and the Working Class makes an innovative and distinctive contribution to the history of emotions as well as American social and cultural history. The focus on courtship and marriage includes an original analysis of nonromantic love. Poetry, letter-writing, and the range of emotions surrounding death are also featured. Working-class feelings are interpreted in response to a wide-range of nineteenth-century experiences, including the Civil War. It is through the lens of personal letters that poor, unschooled Americans show us how they felt about love and how they created meaningful attachments in their uncertain lives.

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