Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America by David Hackett FischerMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
What started out as following a reference in Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers" ended up with me reading this monstrous 900-page behemoth over a period of months (mostly... in the bathroom). I feel like I learned a lot about the different British subcultures that settled in America and their effect on modern US culture. There were definitely some boring stretches - lets face it: Quakers are not that interesting. But the backcountry Southern Highlands stuff was a hoot, and I liked the way he compared each subculture in terms of everything from naming habits to sexual mores. For a serious student of American History, its well worth a read. Most of you can probably skip it, however.
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1 comment:
Hey glad you stuck with it. It's possible that you actually read more of this book that I did in grad school (Fischer was one of my professors) - we were reading for general argument and on a breakneck killer reading schedule, and you - clearly - had more time to contemplate the book's finer details. Bravo!
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