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Archives and Collections in the Twenty-First Century:: From Drab to Sexy

Alexander L. Bieri

in Crisis, Credibility and Corporate History

If the 19th Century was about technological advances, the 20th Century was one during which a societal upheaval started whose effects remain unforeseeable. Most of humanity’s important inventions ... More

If the 19th Century was about technological advances, the 20th Century was one during which a societal upheaval started whose effects remain unforeseeable. Most of humanity’s important inventions were conceived in the 19th Century, but this was a reactionary time in terms of societal change, seeing the reintroduction of a French monarchy, Victorianism in Britain, and Biedermeier in Germany. Eventually, society followed the 20th Century’s technological advances, with much resulting brutality. Cataclysmic changes during the past century still influence society today and are accelerated by new communication forms. Nevertheless, most of our institutions were established by the 19th Century, in which society was still a Ständegesellschaft (estate-based), having emerged from feudalism. These changes have especially powerful effects on museology, collections, and archives – especially those of private corporations. This article aims to give insight into the route archives can take to meet tomorrow’s demands. It also explains why archives are of growing importance, especially for young people.Less

Contractors' Bounties or Due Consideration?: Evidence on the Commercial Nature of The Royal Mail Steam Placket Company's Mail Contracts, 1842-1905

AJ. Arnold and Robert G. Greenhill

in Management, Finance and Industrial Relations in Maritime Industries: Essays in International Maritime and Business History

This essay discusses the negotiation of postal contracts between the government and the private sector, and asks whether the state provided private sector shipping companies with excess returns. The ... More

This essay discusses the negotiation of postal contracts between the government and the private sector, and asks whether the state provided private sector shipping companies with excess returns. The essay also describes the operation of Royal Mail’s mail contracts and the development of its non-contract revenues; its commercial and financial returns, and finally compares its results with financial returns in the second half of the 19th century.Less

Resurrection (1859)

Pamila Gupta

in The relic state: St Francis Xavier and the politics of ritual in Portuguese India

Ritual practice in 1859 continued the Portuguese pattern of staging "Solemn Expositions" that had been initiated in 1782 amidst circulating rumours that Xavier's corpse had been removed by members of ... More

Ritual practice in 1859 continued the Portuguese pattern of staging "Solemn Expositions" that had been initiated in 1782 amidst circulating rumours that Xavier's corpse had been removed by members of the Society of Jesus in the aftermath of their expulsion from Goa in 1759. However, seventy-seven years later, ritual was no longer about securing this saint's location in Goa—the keys to his casket that had been so carefully guarded throughout the 18th century first by the Jesuits and then by colonial officials were now inexplicably lost and the "management" of his corpse less a concern for the Estado da Índia, which was now experiencing even more acutely its own precarious position in Goa. The fifth chapter explores the ritual dimensions of the "Second Solemn Exposition" of 1859 that was staged in the face of a ruinous state that was increasingly uncertain about the longevity of its colonial rule given the dominating and competing presence of the British in India, and their slow but steady encroachment upon this Portuguese colony throughout the 19th century.Less

Ending with a Whimper, Not a Bang: The Relationship between Atlantic History and the Study of the Nineteenth-Century South

Trevor Burnard

in The American South and the Atlantic World

This historiographical chapter argues that, for all its many achievements, Atlantic History’s early modern fixation has exacerbated an unhelpful division between American colonial historians, who ... More

This historiographical chapter argues that, for all its many achievements, Atlantic History’s early modern fixation has exacerbated an unhelpful division between American colonial historians, who have been increasingly committed to Atlanto-centric perspectives, and colleagues working in the later nineteenth century and beyond, who use such paradigms relatively rarely. Like many chapters in the book, it suggests there is great potential in a more elastic temporal approach to the Atlantic World among southern, and other, historians.Less

Conclusions: On Friendship

Charles B. Strozier and Wayne Soini

in Your Friend Forever, A. Lincoln: The Enduring Friendship of Abraham Lincoln and Joshua Speed

The chapter explores the larger meaning of 19th Century male friendship in the context of western thought from Aristotle to Montaigne. The themes of the book are summarized.

Public Sector Data as a Contested Commodity

Alon Peled

in Traversing Digital Babel: Information, E-Government, and Exchange

The chapter explains the concept of a contested commodity - a good whose insertion into the marketplace raises ethical debate. Public data is a contested commodity because agencies hold sensitive ... More

The chapter explains the concept of a contested commodity - a good whose insertion into the marketplace raises ethical debate. Public data is a contested commodity because agencies hold sensitive information about citizens that may not be suited to trade. The histories of the commoditization of thirty contested commodities reveal four lessons for the commoditization of public sector data. A case study of the commoditization of cadavers in 18th and 19th Century Britain reveals an additional four lessons for public sector data exchange.Less

The Early Origins of Ethnic Insularity and Racial Exclusion in the New York City Fire Department

David Goldberg

in Black Firefighters and the FDNY: The Struggle for Jobs, Justice, and Equity in New York City

This chapter discusses how the FDNY’s cultural of insularity evolved during the 19th Century as the department shifted from volunteerism and became professionalized. The chapter also chronicles how ... More

This chapter discusses how the FDNY’s cultural of insularity evolved during the 19th Century as the department shifted from volunteerism and became professionalized. The chapter also chronicles how Irish Americans came to dominate the FDNY and used this workplace culture to consolidate and maintain an ethnic niche within the department.Less

Introduction: Race and Revolution in Cuba

Devyn Spence Benson

in Antiracism in Cuba: The Unfinished Revolution

This Introduction outlines the central questions and arguments of this book: How do ideas about racial difference, racist stereotypes, and racially-discriminatory practices persist, survive, and ... More

This Introduction outlines the central questions and arguments of this book: How do ideas about racial difference, racist stereotypes, and racially-discriminatory practices persist, survive, and reproduce themselves despite significant state efforts to generate social and racial equality. In what ways can racism and equality exist together? And, how have people of African descent challenged, participated in, and negotiated such processes? This chapter also situates the 1959 revolution’s racial politics within over a hundred years of Afro-Cuban history from the wars of independence, to the abolition of slavery, and the inclusion and exclusion of people of African descent in the Cuban republic. The Introduction ends with an anecdote about what it meant for the author, an African American woman from the southern part of the United States, to do field work in Cuba and how her experience reveal the similarities and differences between the US and Cuban racial identification systems.Less

Burning the Dead and the Ways of Nature

Thomas Laqueur

in Second Nature: Rethinking the Natural through Politics

In this chapter, Thomas Laqueur examines the beginnings of the cremation movement in late 19th century Britain. Laqueur shows that while the cremationists challenged cultural attachments to the rites ... More

In this chapter, Thomas Laqueur examines the beginnings of the cremation movement in late 19th century Britain. Laqueur shows that while the cremationists challenged cultural attachments to the rites and rituals of burying the dead, they also invoked the authority of nature, spoken in the voice of science, to legitimate their push for a technical disposal regime. This case illustrates how contestation over nature – and who has the right to speak for it – shapes cultural practices. It also, however, shows how claims to authority over proper ways of disposing of the dead amounts to a claim to speak for nature more generally. [HELP WITH LAST LINE]Less

A Shabby Meanness: Origins of Unequal Taxation

Camille Walsh

in Racial Taxation: Schools, Segregation, and Taxpayer Citizenship, 1869-1973

Chapter One introduces the early history of taxpayer civil rights litigation against segregated and unequal education from the post-Civil War era until the turn of the twentieth century. In these ... More

Chapter One introduces the early history of taxpayer civil rights litigation against segregated and unequal education from the post-Civil War era until the turn of the twentieth century. In these 19th century cases and opinions, there was a continual assertion of a legal identity as taxpayers by families of color, and this chapter traces the way taxpayer citizenship became linked to the idea of a right to education in these families' arguments and claims, and even occasionally in the judges' opinions. Nonetheless, even the victories in many of these segregation cases were in name only, as plaintiffs of color continued to struggle without adequate remedy after courts granted a superficial nod to their taxpayer claims.Less