Ode to Edmund Morgan (1 Viewer)

[jazzeum]

Edmund S. Morgan, who passed away last month and taught US History at Yale University, was one of the great historians this country has produced. He wrote many books but his best known book is American Slavery American Freedom: The Ordeal of Colonial Virginia. If you took introductory courses in American History at an American university or decided to major or minor in US History, you probably would have been assigned this book or run into it along the way. In addition, he influenced many who are now teaching US History, whether on a college or secondary level.

This week The Junto, a blog I follow on Early US History, is doing a roundtable on his legacy.

Today's post can be accessed here, http://earlyamericanists.com/2013/08/05/roundtable-the-legacy-of-edmund-s-morgan/

 

[jazzeum]

On Wednesday, the Junto discussed the following books by Professor Morgan:

The Puritan Family: Religion & Domestic Relations in Seventeenth-Century New England. The discussion can be accessed here, http://earlyamericanists.com/2013/08/06/puritan-family-ties/

Wednesday's discussion concludes with how he changed the way historians interpret the American Revolution in Ed Morgan and the American Revolution, which can be accessed here, http://earlyamericanists.com/2013/08/07/ed-morgan-and-the-american-revolution/

Up until the mid 1940s the prevailing trend was to see the American Revolution arising out of class conflict and economic self interest.

However, Morgan changed that by emphasizing the primacy of ideas and seeing the American Revolutions as a constituional crisis between the English and the colonies.