The Mid-Victorian Generation
The Mid-Victorian Generation

Author: K. Theodore Hoppen

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2000-06-30

Total Pages: 817

ISBN-13: 0192543970

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This, the third volume to appear in the New Oxford History of England, covers the period from the repeal of the Corn Laws to the dramatic failure of Gladstone's first Home Rule Bill. In his magisterial study of the mid-Victorian generation, Theodore Hoppen identifies three defining themes. The first he calls `established industrialism' - the growing acceptance that factory life and manufacturing had come to stay. It was during these four decades that the balance of employment shifted irrevocably. For the first time in history, more people were employed in industry than worked on the land. The second concerns the `multiple national identities' of the constituent parts of the United Kingdom. Dr Hoppen's study of the histories of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and the Empire reveals the existence of a variety of particular and overlapping national traditions flourishing alongside the increasingly influential structure of the unitary state. The third defining theme is that of `interlocking spheres' which the author uses to illuminate the formation of public culture in the period. This, he argues, was generated not by a series of influences operating independently from each other, but by a variety of intermeshed political, economic, scientific, literary and artistic developments. This original and authoritative book will define these pivotal forty years in British history for the next generation.

An Age of Equipoise? Reassessing Mid-Victorian Britain
An Age of Equipoise? Reassessing Mid-Victorian Britain

Author: Martin Hewitt

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2017-07-05

Total Pages: 264

ISBN-13: 1351959158

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The Age of Equipoise by W.L Burn was published in 1964 and became a central text in the canon of interpretations of the Victorian period. The book subsequently fell out of favour but recent claims to establish a new interpretative standard have, paradoxically, prompted reviewers to cast back to Burn's work as the orthodox standard against which such claims should be judged. The essays in this volume by British and American contributors all engage, to varying degrees, with the notion of 'equipoise' and how it can help to illuminate the mid-Victorian period in ways which alternative formulations cannot. Some of the chapters develop arguments embedded in Burn's own book; others take up issues largely absent in The Age of Equipoise, such as the position of children, Britain's interaction with the wider world, and the threats the period experienced to its concept of masculine identity. Together the essays demonstrate the intricacy and turbulence of the forces of cohesion in Victorian society, along with the success of that culture in achieving a working, if shifting, modus vivendi. Moreover, they substantiate the argument that, whatever the limitations of Burn's work, 'equipoise' deserves rehabilitation as a powerful conceptual framework for making sense of mid-Victorian Britain. About the Editor: Martin Hewitt is Director of the Leeds Centre for Victorian Studies and editor of the Journal of Victorian Culture. With Robert Poole he has recently produced an edition of The Diaries of Samuel Bamford, 1858-61 (Sutton, 2000).

A Social History of England 1851-1990
A Social History of England 1851-1990

Author: Francois Bedarida

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-06-17

Total Pages: 402

ISBN-13: 1136097244

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In this, the second edition of A Social History of England, Francois Bédarida has added a new final chapter on the last fifteen years. The book now traces the evolution of English society from the height of the British Empire to the dawn of the single European market. Making full use of the Annales school of French historiography, Bédarida takes his inquiry beyond conventional views to penetrate the attitudes, behaviour and psychology of the British people.

Working Class Radicalism in Mid-Victorian England
Working Class Radicalism in Mid-Victorian England

Author: Trygve Tholfsen

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-03-09

Total Pages: 434

ISBN-13: 1000076679

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Originally published in 1976, Working Class Radicalism in Mid-Victorian England examines working-class radicalism in the mid-Victorian period and suggests that after the fading of Chartist militancy the radical tradition was preserved in a working-class subculture that enabled working men to resist the full consolidation of middle-class hegemony. The book traces the growth of working-class radicalism as it developed dialectically in confrontation with middle-class liberal ideology in the generation after Waterloo. Intellectual forces were of central importance in shaping the character of the working-class Left and the Enlightenment, in particular, as the chief source of ideological weapons that were turned against the established order. The Enlightenment also provided the intellectual foundations of the middle-class ideology that was directed against the incipient threat of popular radicalism. The book notes that the same intellectual forces that entered into the first half of the nineteenth century also shaped the value system that provided the foundations of mid-Victorian urban culture. These forces also contributed to the rapprochement between working-class liberalism, bringing latent affinities to the surface. It is also emphasised, however, that inherited ideas and traditions exercised their influence in interaction with the structure of power and status.

Victorian Britain (Routledge Revivals)
Victorian Britain (Routledge Revivals)

Author: Sally Mitchell

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2012-08-06

Total Pages: 1014

ISBN-13: 1136716173

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First published in 1988, this encyclopedia serves as an overview and point of entry to the complex interdisciplinary field of Victorian studies. The signed articles, which cover persons, events, institutions, topics, groups and artefacts in Great Britain between 1837 and 1901, have been written by authorities in the field and contain bibliographies to provide guidelines for further research. The work is intended for undergraduates and the general reader, and also as a starting point for graduates who wish to explore new fields.

Social Class of the Mid-Victorian Period and its Values
Social Class of the Mid-Victorian Period and its Values

Author: Alexandra Köhler

Publisher: GRIN Verlag

Published: 2008-10-10

Total Pages: 17

ISBN-13: 3640185536

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Seminar paper from the year 2007 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Culture and Applied Geography, grade: Sehr gut, University of Osnabrück, course: Seminar, language: English, abstract: The term “Victorian” remains a living concept in our daily society. The term is related to the reign of Queen Victoria of England from 1837 to 1901. Since it covers a wide time span, the era has been divided into the early-Victorian period (1837-1851), the mid-Victorian period (1851-1875) and the late-Victorian period (1875-1901). “Victorian” is also used today to describe British furniture and architecture made during the greater part of the 19th century. Additionally it refers to British literary works which were written, for instance by Wilkie Collins or Charles Dickens. Furthermore specific social and moral attitudes are associated with the word “Victorian.” The Victorian age was an age of transition. England was transformed from a feudal and agricultural society into an industrial democracy. Nevertheless the process of the industrial revolution did not only create progress but also problems. One drawback was the hierarchy which was created in the British society leading to a division of people into distinctive social classes. In order to analyze the class distinctions more precisely this term paper concentrates on the specific class divisions that arose especially between the middle class and the working class and on how these differences were characterized. In addition, the three well known Victorian values of the middle and working class, family life, respectability and self-help, are defined and discussed. Due to the fact that it is not possible to discuss the whole Victorian period as one homogenous era, the discussion of the social classes and their values is restricted to the mid-Victorian period. In order to understand the society in the Victorian era it is necessary to depict a brief overview of the historical circumstances concerning the Victorian society.

The Age of Improvement, 1783-1867
The Age of Improvement, 1783-1867

Author: Asa Briggs

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-06-17

Total Pages: 584

ISBN-13: 1317878531

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The Age of Improvement has long established itself as a classic of modern historical writing. Widely read and quoted it has had a unique influence on teaching and research. This second edition draws on the great volume of new research - produced by Lord Briggs amongst others, since its original publication. The book stresses both the underlying unity and the rich variety of the age, and raises fundamental issues about a period of crucial change in British history - industrialisation, war, constitutional change and the attitudes of politicians towards it, political development, and, not least, society and culture. In the background are the new economic powers based on the development of a coal and iron technology; in the foreground, new social and political problems and new ways of tackling them. The author also discusses perceptions of, and reactions to, changing circumstances, the influence of religion and science on national life, and changing styles in art and literature. The story ends, not with a full stop but with a question mark. Could improvement be maintained? Could balance and progress continue to be reconciled?

Society and Economy in Modern Britain 1700-1850
Society and Economy in Modern Britain 1700-1850

Author: Richard Brown

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2002-11-01

Total Pages: 496

ISBN-13: 1134982771

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For both contemporaries and later historians the Industrial Revolution is viewed as a turning point' in modern British history. There is no doubt that change occurred, but what was the nature of that change and how did affect rural and urban society? Beginning with an examination of the nature of history and Britain in 1700, this volume focuses on the economic and social aspects of the Industrial Revolution. Unlike many previous textbooks on the same period, it emphasizes British history, and deals with developments in Wales, Scotland, and Ireland in their own right. It is the emphasis on the diversity, not the uniformity of experience, on continuities as well as change in this crucial period of development, which makes this volume distinctive. In his companion title Richard Brown completes his examination of the period and looks at the changes that took place in Britain's political system and in its religious affiliations.

Grand Designs
Grand Designs

Author: Lara Kriegel

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2008-01-02

Total Pages: 333

ISBN-13: 0822390531

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With this richly illustrated history of industrial design reform in nineteenth-century Britain, Lara Kriegel demonstrates that preoccupations with trade, labor, and manufacture lay at the heart of debates about cultural institutions during the Victorian era. Through aesthetic reform, Victorians sought to redress the inferiority of British crafts in comparison to those made on the continent and in the colonies. Declaring a crisis of design and workmanship among the British laboring classes, reformers pioneered schools of design, copyright protections, and spectacular displays of industrial and imperial wares, most notably the Great Exhibition of 1851. Their efforts culminated with the establishment of the South Kensington Museum, predecessor to the Victoria and Albert Museum, which stands today as home to the world’s foremost collection of the decorative and applied arts. Kriegel’s identification of the significant links between markets and museums, and between economics and aesthetics, amounts to a rethinking of Victorian cultural formation. Drawing on a wide range of sources, including museum guidebooks, design manuals, illustrated newspapers, pattern books, and government reports, Kriegel brings to life the many Victorians who claimed a stake in aesthetic reform during the middle years of the nineteenth century. The aspiring artists who attended the Government School of Design, the embattled provincial printers who sought a strengthened industrial copyright, the exhibition-going millions who visited the Crystal Palace, the lower-middle-class consumers who learned new principles of taste in metropolitan museums, and the working men of London who critiqued the city’s art and design collections—all are cast by Kriegel as leading cultural actors of their day. Grand Designs shows how these Victorians vied to upend aesthetic hierarchies in an imperial age and, in the process, to refashion London’s public culture.