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Circles and Lines: The Shape of Life in Early America
by
John Demos
In this intimate, engaging book, John Demos offers an illuminating portrait of how colonial Americans, from the first settlers to the postrevolutionary generation, viewed their life experiences. He also offers an invaluable inside look into the craft of a master social historian as he unearths--in sometimes unexpected places--fragments of evidence that help us probe the in...more
Hardcover, 112 pages
Published
May 28th 2004
by Harvard University Press
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Loved his short bit about the changing definition of the term "revolution," especially as it happens when, according to Demos, American's were transitioning from a circular worldview to a linear worldview. Since the Middle Ages, the word revolution was used to describe the turning of a cyclical object like how we refer to earth's movement today. When the term was used in later years in the political realm, it referred to the act of restoring that which was lost. Again, a cyclical rebirth. It was...more
A study of how we moved from circular thinking, the way people have thought about their lives for thousands of years, to linear thinking, the way we think now. It hinges on the American Revolution; that is when the change began to develop. And the definition of Revolution is key to the whole thing. Originally it meant "things that turned, that rotated--circular and cyclical things." During the American Revolution, it came to be used to mean restoration, "of reengaging principles and structures s...more
What an interesting book. Author Demos, an expert on colonial and early American society, brings insights gained from a long career to illustrate how everyday life was impacted by the absence of things we now take for granted and depend upon. Anyone who lived through last October's New England snowstorm can relate, because, although it was only for a week, life was rather primitive for those of us without electric power. Demos describes how dark it was outdoors in the absence of artificial light...more
This book was OK. The author is the professor I'll be working with at Yale in a week, so I had to read it. There were some interesting insights into early colonial life, but if I didn't have to read it, I wouldn't have.
Although a short book, it is full of fascinating revelations about how early Americans experienced time. Highly recommended.
Mar 19, 2013
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