Synopses & Reviews
Newarks volatile past is infamous. The city has become synonymous with the Black Power movement and urban crisis. Its history reveals a vibrant and contentious political culture punctuated by traditional civic pride and an understudied tradition of protest in the black community.
Newark charts this important city's place in the nation, from its founding in 1666 by a dissident Puritan as a refuge from intolerance, through the days of Jim Crow and World War II civil rights activism, to the height of postwar integration and the election of its first black mayor.
In this broad and balanced history of Newark, Kevin Mumford applies the concept of the public sphere to the problem of race relations, demonstrating how political ideas and print culture were instrumental in shaping African American consciousness. He draws on both public and personal archives, interpreting official documents - such as newspapers, commission testimony, and government records—alongside interviews, political flyers, meeting minutes, and rare photos.
From the migration out of the South to the rise of public housing and ethnic conflict, Newark explains the impact of African Americans on the reconstruction of American cities in the twentieth century.
Review
"[Adams and van Minnen] deserve commendation for the unfailing clarity of conception and expression in the volume's essays." -Religious Studies Review,
Review
"Religious and Secular Reform in America should be of interest to anyone seeking a fresh perspective on American history." -Journal of the Academy for Evangelism,
Review
"Historians looking for fresh insights into the reform tradition in America should enjoy Religious and Secular Reform in America" -The Journal of the Early Republic,
Review
"[Adams and van Minnen] deserve commendation for the unfailing clarity of conception and expression in the volume's essays."
"Religious and Secular Reform in America should be of interest to anyone seeking a fresh perspective on American history."
"Historians looking for fresh insights into the reform tradition in America should enjoy Religious and Secular Reform in America"
Review
“Excellent, lively, and learned. . . . An engaging and unsettling study of the city.”
-The Bloomsbury Review,
Review
“From the city's early days, where African-Americans fought for recognition and dignity, to their ascension to elected office in the midst of the Black Power movement, and then through countless though crucial fragments as new power brokers emerged amid old differences in vision, tactics and goals, Newark is spellbinding, and worth your attention.Newark-Altreads.com,
Review
&8220;Mumford explores the devastating effect of the riots and how the city police, state police, and National Guard escalated the violence. He raises the controversial possibility that female looters stripping store mannequins may have been making a social statement about economic inequality. He also discusses such divisive personalities as Anthony Imperiale of the Citizens Council, with his anti-black sentiments, and the poet Amiri Baraka, who melded black nationalism with anti-white and, occasionally, anti- Semitic rhetoric.”
-New Jersey Star Ledger,
Review
“Meticulously researched and engagingly written, Newark tells an important story. Portraying a city that functions as an archetype for Black Power in urban politics, Mumford writes with great sympathy for an earlier liberal integrationist tradition, periodizing and explaining its rise and fall carefully, eloquently, and persuasively.”
-David Roediger,author of Working toward Whiteness
Synopsis
From its earliest days, the United States has provided fertile ground for reform movements to flourish. In this volume, twelve eminent historians assess religious and secular reform in America from the eighteenth century to the present day.
The essays offer a mix of general overviews and specific case studies, addressing such topics as radical religion in New England, leisure in antebellum America, Sabbatarianism, the Women's Christian Temperance Union, and Evangelicalism, social reform, and the U.S. welfare state.
Suitable for students, the essays, each based on original research, will also be of interest to researchers and academics working in this area, as well as to all those with an interest in the history of religious and secular reform in America.
Synopsis
From its earliest days, the United States has provided fertile ground for reform movements to flourish. In this volume, twelve eminent historians assess religious and secular reform in America from the eighteenth century to the present day.
The essays offer a mix of general overviews and specific case studies, addressing such topics as radical religion in New England, leisure in antebellum America, Sabbatarianism, the Women's Christian Temperance Union, and Evangelicalism, social reform, and the U.S. welfare state.
Suitable for students, the essays, each based on original research, will also be of interest to researchers and academics working in this area, as well as to all those with an interest in the history of religious and secular reform in America.
About the Author
David K. Adams is Professor of American Studies and Director of the David Bruce Centre at Keele University in England.
Cornelius A. Van Minnen is Executive Director of the Roosevelt Study Center in Middelburg, The Netherlands.