Citizen Bachelors: Manhood and the Creation of the United States
"Many single men in eighteenth-century England and America faced heavy, discriminatory taxation, but rather than obliterating 'the solitary state,' such policies served instead to politicize bachelors and to draw them fully to the brink of citizenship. InCitizen Bachelors, John Gilbert McCurdy writes the history of this remarkable development. His narrative is convincing, elegant, and often astonishing. He explores both the lived experiences of single men and the social construction of bachelorhood as a gendered identity. . . . McCurdy's narrative . . . makes a vital contribution to the study of early American manhood and masculinity. . . . Written in clear, uncluttered prose and offering rich rewards for scholars of gender, sexuality, the family, and the law,Citizen Bachelorsshould be singled out for careful reading."—Benjamin Irvin,H-SHEAR, H-Net Reviews, January 2010"MCurdy has produced a valuable volume in this careful and highly readable inventory of early American bachelors and their cultural representations. When combined with the many related works on sexuality in this period, the book helps us understand a world long neglected and misrepresented. It is vital that we appreciate how different colonial society's cultural and sexual norms were from our own; the bachelor we recognize today was not known in early colonial North America. With this useful study, however, we can begin to see how this familiar figure first came into existence."—David D. Doyle,New England Quarterly, Spring 2009"McCurdy succeeds brilliantly in showing how the legal standing of 'bachelors' changed over the course of the colonial and revolutionary eras. . . . Drawing enlightening comparisons between New England, the Chesapeake, and Pennsylvania, he is able to show how laws across the colonies were moving in a similar direction . . . [as they] collectively began to carve a space for adult single men in society. McCurdy also unearths some fascinating snapshots of the subjective experience of bachelorhood."—Rodney Hessinger,Men and Masculinities(December 2011)"Although this book is about men, like the best new works on masculinityCitizen Bachelorsrepeatedly brings its subject into conversation with women's history."—William and Mary Quarterly"John Gilbert McCurdy considers the political history of bachelors in all the colonies and over the course of the entire colonial period through the Revolutionary era. He makes use of all sorts of evidence, including statutes, popular literature, demographic data, and tax records. He describes a clear trajectory of the rise and fall of unequal treatment of bachelors in eighteenth-century America and persuasively suggests that this history is an important piece of the larger story of gender and democratic revolution. All scholars of early American manhood as well as of gender and citizenship should read this engaging book."—C. Dallett Hemphill, Ursinus College, author ofBowing to Necessities: A History of Manners in America"Citizen Bachelorsis a good read: lucid, concise and compelling. John Gilbert McCurdy's insightful study of unmarried young men and never-married men is an important and original contribution to our knowledge of personal identity, family, and legal status in early America."—Susan E. Klepp, Temple University, coeditor ofInfortunate: The Voyage and Adventures of William Moraley, An Indentured Servant