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Benjamin Park

16 Jul, 16 tweets, 10 min read

@SHEARites

I've been really enjoying the virtual #SHEAR2021 conference, though certainly missing seeing everyone in person. But one of my favorite events are the book awards, so in advance of tonight's @SHEARites announcements, here are my Top #10 Early Republic Books from 2020.

First, because I'm a cheater, I want to list three "Honorable Mentions"--books that I loved, but probably fall just outside SHEAR's scope, which I interpret as *after* the Revolution and *before* the Civil War.

@SerenaZabin

Honorable Mention #1: @SerenaZabin's THE BOSTON MASSACRE: A FAMILY HISTORY, a gripping social history that brought new perspectives on the local conflict that ignited a global war. indiebound.org/book/978054491…

@Harvard_Press

Honorable Mention #2: Vincent Brown's TACKY'S WAR: THE STORY OF AN ATLANTIC SLAVE WAR (@Harvard_Press), which reimagines a series of "revolts" as a prolonged movement for racial justice. hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?is…

@megankatenelson

Honorable Mention #3: @megankatenelson's THE THREE-CORNERED WAR: THE UNION, THE CONFEDERACY, AND NATIVE PEOPLES IN THE FIGHT FOR THE WEST (@ScribnerBooks), which not only proves the West mattered in the Civil War, but so do individual stories. simonandschuster.com/books/The-Thre…

@johngmarks

And now my Top 10. Note these are my personal taste & I reserve the right to add books I embarrassingly forgot.

10: @johngmarks's BLACK FREEDOM IN THE AGE OF SLAVERY: RACE, STATUS, AND IDENTITY IN THE URBAN AMERICAS (@USCPress), a story w/scope and power. uscpress.com/Black-Freedom-…

@MichaelHattem

9: @MichaelHattem's PAST AND PROLOGUE: POLITICS AND MEMORY IN THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION (@yalepress), a fascinating and sophisticated intellectual history.

(Maybe too "Revolution-period," so sue me. [Please don't.]) yalebooks.yale.edu/book/978030023…

@BoldTypeBooks

8: Jonathan Wells's THE KIDNAPPING CLUB: WALL STREET, SLAVERY, AND RESISTANCE ON THE EVE OF THE CIVIL WAR (@BoldTypeBooks), a moving and poignant case study on a broader story. boldtypebooks.com/titles/jonatha…

@lmchervinsky

7: @lmchervinsky's THE CABINET: GEORGE WASHINGTON AND THE CREATION OF AN AMERICAN INSTITUTION (@Harvard_Press), an engaging and smart take on the origins of something we now take for granted. hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?is…

@benjamingwright

6: @benjamingwright's BONDS OF SALVATION: HOW CHRISTIANITY INSPIRED AND LIMITED AMERICAN ABOLITIONISM (@lsupress), not only a great history but important moral lesson. lsupress.org/books/detail/b…

@drjohnaeharris

5: @drjohnaeharris's THE LAST SLAVE SHIPS: NEW YORK AND THE END OF THE MIDDLE PASSAGE (@yalepress), which traces the persistence of this nefarious practice long after American's believed. yalebooks.yale.edu/book/978030024…

@a_l_baumgartner

4: @a_l_baumgartner's SOUTH TO FREEDOM: RUNAWAY SLAVES TO MEXICO AND THE ROAD TO THE CIVIL WAR (@BasicBooks), which reverses the general narrative and sheds new light on emancipation. basicbooks.com/titles/alice-l…

@PrincetonUPress

3, and my pick for BEST BIOGRAPHY: Christopher Tomlin's IN THE MATTER OF NAT TURNER: A SPECULATIVE HISTORY (@PrincetonUPress), a deeply meditative history that drips with insight on every page. press.princeton.edu/books/hardcove…

@jmjafrx

2, and my pick for BEST FIRST BOOK: @jmjafrx's WICKED FLESH: BLACK WOMEN, INTIMACY, AND FREEDOM IN THE ATLANTIC WORLD (@PennPress), not only a contribution to early republic history, but historical methodology in general. upenn.edu/pennpress/book…

@ClaudioSaunt

1, and my pick for BEST BOOK: @ClaudioSaunt's UNWORTHY REPUBLIC: THE DISPOSITION OF NATIVE AMERICANS AND THE ROAD TO INDIAN TERRITORY (@wwnorton), a powerful and detailed condemnation of one of America's worst moments. wwnorton.com/books/unworthy…

What a year for scholarship! The SHEAR field is as strong as ever. I don't envy the awards committees for having to make the actual decisions!

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More from @BenjaminEPark

Benjamin Park

@BenjaminEPark

6 Jun

@benjamingwright

Spent my sabbath morning returning to @benjamingwright’s powerful, and quite relevant, BONDS OF SALVATION: HOW CHRISTIANITY INSPIRED AND LIMITED AMERICAN ABOLITIONISM, to resurrect my #ReviewThread series.

Note: capitalized words are categories. /1

SUMMARY: from the beginning, most American Christians could be categorized in two camps: conversionists, or those who believed spreading salvation was too priority, and purificationists, or those who believed abolition would purify the nation. /2

During the revolutionary era, there was genuine hope that slavery could be abolished, and Wright highlights these early purificationist voices. However, most came to see missionary work and national salvation as the more pressing need, so they distanced from abolition. /3

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Benjamin Park

@BenjaminEPark

22 Apr

There’s few more consequential figures in Mormon studies than D. Michael Quinn, who worked for LDS church, taught at BYU, was excommunicated, & published a series of books that reshaped the field.

Mike passed away last night. I’d like to highlight some of his life and impact. /1

Quinn was born to a Mexican immigrant father & sixth-generation Mormon mother. He earned a degree in English from BYU, served mission to UK, then spent 3 years in military before finding history. He 1st did MA at Utah, then a PhD at Yale, where he studied the Mormon hierarchy. /2

His research coincided with historical openness at the LDS archives, & he was hired by Leonard Arrington to mine boxes & boxes of documents, many of them untouched. The period was later referred to as “Camelot,” and Quinn referred to every day as “Christmas morning.” /3

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Benjamin Park

@BenjaminEPark

25 Feb

I vividly remember my American Heritage teacher at BYU spending an entire week arguing why raising the minimum wage would not only be disastrous for the economy, but a betrayal of LDS theology.

It was that moment I recognized the cultural gulf between me and many in the faith.

Also, there’s a great history to be written dissecting BYU’s massive American Heritage program to understand the modern Mormon mind. My textbook had an image that showed abortion rights as the first step toward atheist totalitarianism.

Also also, I’ll always remember how, after the prof spent the whole semester railing against socialist countries, an international student raised her hand and said her experience being raised in a European nation was sublime.

He proceeded to call her a liar. True story.

Read 4 tweets

Benjamin Park

@BenjaminEPark

29 Dec 20

In honor of passing 10k followers, how about a #MormonAmerica thread? (For those new: these are historical threads drawn from my current book project.)

Tonight, let's talk about the rise & fall of Amy Brown & Richard Lyman, the most significant LDS couple in the 20th century. /1

Amy Brown and Richard Lyman were born to prominent Mormon families in 1872 and 1870, respectively. They met at Brigham Young Academy in 1888 and were quickly drawn to each other. /2

Richard was tall, broad-shouldered, and exceptionally smart, not to mention handsome. Both his father and grandfather were apostles, and he was expected to succeed in both secular and ecclesiastical roles. /3

Read 22 tweets

Benjamin Park

@BenjaminEPark

28 Nov 20

Public health crisis-related #MormonAmerica story time? Public health crisis-related #MormonAmerica story time.

Let's talk about a time when Utahns rejected medical intervention as an infringement on personal rights, resulting in unnecessary suffering and death. /1

Around 1900, smallpox, a scourge that had troubled civilizations for centuries, was becoming more containable. Crude vaccines had been around for generations, but in the 1890s scientific advances made them more reliable and available, resulting in state mandates. /2

Like many states, Utah debated whether they should require vaccination. Some LDS leaders supported the measure, while others opposed. As a result of this division, and because they wanted to appear separate from the state, however, the church decided to mostly remain silent. /3

Read 12 tweets

Benjamin Park

@BenjaminEPark

29 Oct 20

While Frederick Douglass is being recognized more and more nowadays, and his powerful anti-racist arguments are increasingly popular, I think there's another part of his legacy that is overlooked.

This is random, but here's a short thread on Douglass and religious liberty. /1

It's sometimes overlooked that Douglass's first job, after escaping slavery, was as a preacher, and many of his literacy lessons came from reading the bible. This, of course, makes sense given his frequent biblical allusions, the number of which always astound my students. /2

Yet a trenchant theme found throughout his abolitionist career was his critique of present religious institutions that supported slavery and, simultaneously, his firm belief in religiosity's importance within the nation. /3

Read 12 tweets

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