Sex and the Eighteenth-Century Man: Massachusetts and the History of Sexuality in America
This compelling study of 18th-century male gender mores and sexuality is filled with engrossing historical details, demonstrating that 18th-century American ideas about masculinity were complexly tied to religion, economics and the body. For example, a 1746 newspaper article proposed a tax on single people, since they "promise no help to the future generation"; American colonists understood male effeminacy to be as much a sign of wasteful consumption as sexual deviance; and in 1742 Rev. John Cleveland referred to God as "his first husband." Foster, assistant professor of history at DePaul University, has mined a variety of primary sources, including letters and diaries of colonial men, 18th-century Boston newspapers and moral guidebooks such as Daniel Lewes's 1725The Sins of Youth, many of which have not been analyzed before. He uncovers intriguing and historically important examples that provoke rethinking of the history of gender in America, and he also makes some bold claims—including debunking Michel Foucault's famous dictum that before modernism, sexuality was defined by actions not identities. This is vital reading for anyone seriously interested in American history or gender studies.(Sept.)Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.