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"By The Glory Of Our Fathers": Theodore Parker And The American Revolution, Benjamin E. Park

The Thetean: A Student Journal for Scholarly Historical Writing

Just like any significant historical event, the Memory and ideals of the American Revolution became an important point of reference for the many rhetoricians that followed. Politicians, reformers, and ministers used the "spirit" or "age" the Revolution as an authoritative text for their modern agendas. As a result, the meaning of the event became malleable, with many people claiming a different lesson to be used for their specific cause. Theodore Parker, a Bostonian Transcendentalist minister writing during the two decades prior to the Civil War, was one of these individuals. He hearkened back to the Revolution as a way to …

The Tree Of "Bitter Fruit": Why Anarchism Failed In Transylvania, Richard Bruner

The Thetean: A Student Journal for Scholarly Historical Writing

Today, the word "anarchy" conjures images of bombs, anti-government protests, and chaos. Achough that may be the modern perception of anarchy, the image did not begin like that. The term has existed for ages, only evolving toward its modern connotation during the nineteenth century. The Greek meaning of the term is "contrary to authority or without a ruler." Anarchy existed as a loose term for the lack of government, or to describe chose who opposed government-often with a derogatory meaning attached to it. Then, in the 1840s Jean-Pierre Proudhon adopted the term to describe his political and social philosophies. Simply …

Slim Winnings For Tubby Taft: Utah And The Presidential Election Of 1912, Natalie Larsen

The Thetean: A Student Journal for Scholarly Historical Writing

Traveling on a special passenger train from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles, Utah governor William Spry waxed uncharacteristically eloquent with the reporters who hounded him for his insights on the 1914 congressional elections. Sent by the roundly Republican newspaper the Los Angeles Times, the reporters were looking to see how the dust had settled after the humiliating Republican losses two years earlier in 1912. Democrat Woodrow Wilson won a resounding victory that year, while Theodore Roosevelc's Progressive Parry won eighry-eight electoral votes, and the incumbent president William Howard Taft limped away with a meager eight electoral votes. Considering …

From Victorian Doubt To American Deconstruction: Exploring Faith Crises Across Time And Geography, Bailey Anne Melton

Theses and Dissertations

This research consists of a comparative analysis of faith crises in two distinct historical periods: the Victorian era (1830s-1914) and modern America. Through examining the Victorian crisis of faith and the contemporary American deconstruction movement within Protestant Evangelicalism, this study explores the common themes, diverse responses, and enduring relevance of faith doubt within Christianity. The Victorian crisis emerged amidst scientific advancements, theological debates, and shifting societal norms, prompting intellectuals to grapple with doubts about traditional Christian beliefs. Prominent figures publicly challenged religious orthodoxy, while evolving scientific theories, particularly evolution, further fueled skepticism. In contrast, the American crisis of Evangelicalism is …

“Every Nation Except Our Own”: The Social Gospel, Anti-Immigrant Sentiments, And U.S. Foreign Policy, Andrea Darmawan

Student Research Submissions

This thesis concerns the social gospel, a liberal Protestant movement that enjoyed its heyday in the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries. The thesis argues that the movement’s two most prominent figures, Washington Gladden and Walter Rauschenbusch, expressed an antipathy toward immigrants and a paternalistic attitude toward foreign nations and cultures. These attitudes then laid the foundation for contemporary anti-immigrant sentiments and US foreign policy. Gladden and Rauschenbusch’s rhetoric contains sentiments which act as a precursor to various elements of American exceptionalism, from missionary activity abroad to liberal attitudes toward the Middle East after 9/11. These links have …

Roan, Alex, Paige Ravenscraft

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Alex Roan is a 42 year old trans masc individual who uses he/him pronouns. He was originally from Stoughton, Massachusetts where he grew up with his family before moving to Central Maine for college and living in the Portland area through adulthood. Alex shares his experience with growing up in a Catholic family and finding himself as a trans person in college. He details what it was like to come out to his family, who was in denial at first but later in life became his biggest supporters.

Alex Roan is the founder of MaineTransNet. This interview captures the story …

Michaud, Jim, Angelli Bishop

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Jim Michaud, (he/him), was born in 1964. Jim is a local Mainer, born and raised in Lewiston, Maine. He was born into a middle-class family with his siblings, was raised Catholic, and even attended Catholic school in his earlier years. Since the late eighties, Jim has identified as a gay man. He is a USM alumnus and attended the USM Gay Men's Alliance, which was his first ever encounter participating in an LGBTQ-organized environment. Being proactive in his political activism, Jim annually attends the Pride Parades in Boston, New York, and Maine. He stresses the importance of creating open space …

(Special Section) The Hymn As Protest Song In England And Its Empire, 1819–1919, Oskar Cox Jensen

Yale Journal of Music & Religion

Hymns played a role in envoicing the politics of protest in England long before their integration in the established Church – and do so to this day. Yet it was nineteenth-century radical movements that embraced the hymn as in many ways the ideal musical form. From the bloody field of Peterloo to the secularising South Place Society, from the mass meetings of Chartists to the top-down productions of the Fabian socialists, the century resounded with this increasingly familiar music.

Many writers laid claim to the rhetoric of the hymn to advance causes from abolitionism to solidarity with Poles exiled to …

Referendum Metrics: The Numbers Game, Chapter Five From Perils And Prospects Of A United Ireland, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article is an extract from Perils and Prospects of a United Ireland, published by Lilliput Press, Dublin, Ireland in March 2023. The book draws on extensive interviews with ninety-seven senior politicians across the ethno-national divide, a range of academics and political commentators, and religious leaders.

The context for the chapter is the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement (B/GFA), which ended thirty years of violent conflict between Irish republicans, mostly Catholic, who wanted Northern Ireland to become reunified with the rest of Ireland, and unionists, mostly Protestants supported by British security forces, who wanted to maintain the union of Northern Ireland …

Lg Ms 079 Steven G. Bull Papers, Jill Piekut Roy, Jeremy Rundstrom

Search the Manuscript Collection (Finding Aids)

Description:

Papers include correspondence, photographs, publications, and ephemera documenting the beginning of the gay liberation movement in Maine and Steve Bull's participation in the movement both in Maine and nationally, especially through his involvement with the founding of the Wilde-Stein Club at University of Maine Orono in 1973 and his chairmanship of the first Maine Gay Symposium in 1974. Letters received by Bull and his friends, both personally and as Wilde-Stein Club officials, are evidence of the attitudes of both supporters of gay liberation and its opponents in the 1970s. Bull's research papers document the University of Maine's reaction to …

Savages And Sable Subjects: White Fear, Racism, And The Demonization Of Creole Voodoo In New Orleans In The 19th Century, Christopher L. Newman

Madison Historical Review

Prior to the Haitian Revolution, the religion of Voodoo maintained a safe and uninterrupted presence in New Orleans. Practiced by free and enslaved Blacks, Voodoo thrived within the larger Creole culture of the Louisiana territory. However, after the rebellion, white slaveholders in New Orleans would come to regard Voodoo as an evil, savage superstition related to Haitian Vodou. The demonizing of New Orleans Voodoo would emerge from white slaveholders’ fears of slave uprisings inspired by the Haitian Revolution and a migration of Haitian rebels into New Orleans. Yet theological objections were not the primary impetus for white aggressions toward Creole …

A Century Of Critical Buddhism In Japan, James Mark Shields

Faculty Contributions to Books

This chapter introduces the central arguments of Critical Buddhism as a lens by which to view the course of “modern” Buddhism in Japan, particularly as it relates to politics. It traces philosophical and political precedents for Critical Buddhism in the context of Japanese modernity, by focusing on several progressive Buddhist figures movements from mid-Meiji through early Shōwa, including the New Buddhist Fellowship and the Youth League for Revitalizing Buddhism. I argue that previous attempts to centralize criticism as a basic Buddhist precept were unsuccessful in part do to an inability to distinguish the Buddhistic components of their thought and practice, …

At Any And All Hazards: Manifest Destiny, The Monroe Doctrine, And The Balance Of Power In North America, Keith Thomas Ressa

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Contrary to the beliefs of New Left historians seeking to revive the once discredited theory that American territorial expansion was driven by a motivation to expand the institution of slavery, a position that I have dubbed the Neo-Abolitionist view, rather that Manifest Destiny developed as an early national security strategy and primitive strategic doctrine, what might be termed in today’s vernacular as a kind of preemptive threat displacement theory. That is, early on in the history of the Republic, many American statesmen believed that the most effective means of preventing a “balance of power” geopolitical system from being established in …

The Parish Choir Movement And Generational Festivals In Romania’S Socialist Period: New Community Festivities In Transylvania’S Gheorgheni (Gyergyó) Region, Eszter Kovács

Journal of Global Catholicism

Among the post-1945 East European socialist regimes, Romania and Poland were the only countries where the Catholic Church—despite government interventions, controls, and bans—managed to play a significant social and political role in community life. This case study provides an ethnographic description of the parish choir movement and graduating class reunions, called “generational festivals” in Hungarian, in the Gheorgheni (Hu: Gyergyó) region in the 1970s and 1980s. The gatherings will be analyzed in the context of everyday life, the socialist system’s distinctive shortage economy, and official limits on religious activity that characterized the era. I will first describe the world of …

History’S Pathologists: Oswald Spengler, Jacques Barzun, John Lukacs And The Dying Of The West, Michael A. Flannery

UAB Libraries Professional Work

No abstract provided.

“Why Invest In Racism?”: Anti-Apartheid Activism At The University Of Illinois, 1977-1987, Shane Smith

Student Honors Theses

On February 11, 1990, Nelson Mandela walked out of prison a free man after being held captive for over 27 years. Crowds roared with joyfulness as their beacon of hope pumped his right fist in the air triumphantly. The international community watched the occasion with hope and a feeling of success after the assistance in the struggle to bring down the brutal regime of apartheid. This inspiring movement took decades of unified activism from both South Africans and local, grassroots organizations to bring the system down. Amidst the ongoing Cold War politics and other international issues, dismantling apartheid proved to …

Mf140 Victoria Society Portland Oral History Series, Special Collections, Raymond H. Fogler Library, University Of Maine

Northeast Archives of Folklore and Oral History Finding Aids

A series of 36 interviews about the history of Portland, Maine with index and partial and full transcripts. The Victoria Society, fall 1992. Interviews concerning life in Portland during the 1930s to the 1940s, most interviewees are 75 years old or older.

Guide To The Benjamin Spence Research Collection, 1877-1925, Noah Smith

Archives & Special Collections Finding Aids

Nearly all content in this collection comes from microfilm of the Bridgewater Independent, covering the years from approximately 1880 to 1925. Dr. Spence spent ten years printing out pages from the microfilm, cutting the content into individual articles, and putting them onto index cards filed by subject. He included hand-written notes and dates on the cards. His research focusing on the years represented by the collection resulted in a collection of ten written works on this time period, referenced together as, Bridgewater, Massachusetts: A Town in Transition. Links to the digital files of these works can be found …

"Glory To The English And Protestant Name": Protestant Hegemony In Seventeenth And Eighteenth-Century Rhode Island, Mark Mulligan

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

This dissertation argues that Protestant hegemony prevailed in colonial Rhode Island in the absence of an established church, which demonstrates that church establishment was not the primary fuel of Protestant hegemony in the early modern English Atlantic world. Analyzing a combination of well-known and lesser-known books, letters, diaries, newspapers, and laws, my findings indicate that Rhode Island championed a broad Protestant synthesis that transcended individual denominations. While historians have identified this Protestant synthesis in the era of the early republic in the United States, my research shows that these forces of synthesis and hegemony without establishment existed at least two …

The History Of Apologetics: A Collaborative Article Review, Isaiah B. Parker

Eleutheria: John W. Rawlings School of Divinity Academic Journal

In The History of Apologetics, the authors examine a variety of noteworthy Western apologists throughout seven distinct historical eras: Patristic, Medieval, Early Modern, Nineteenth Century, Twentieth Century (American), Twentieth Century (European), and Contemporary. Each chapter presents four essential elements relating to the life and work of one apologist: historical background, theological context, apologetic methodology and response, and critical contribution(s) to apologetics. They aim to provide an overview of influential apologists within their unique cultural contexts. This review structures its content in the same manner, albeit with some necessary minor changes to the elements for ease of reading. The historical …

Geist, Dale, Abby Milewski

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Ever since his coming out in a Facebook post, Dale Geist has championed queer representation in one of the most conservative music genres. Country. He is the founder of the online blog called Country Queer, where his goal is to shine a light on LGBTQ+ country and Americana music artists. He talks about influential artists such as Bob Dylan, The Indigo Girls, Elton John, Brandie Carlile, and David Bowie. In this 50-minute interview, Geist covers many stories from his life, including discovering his sexuality, the importance of media representation, David Bowie’s positive influence on the bisexual community, and the cultural …

Marine, Benn, Andrea Carpenter

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Benn is a 37-year-old trans man living in Maine. He identifies as being pansexual because he feels that he falls in love with personalities regardless of the person’s gender. He grew up with his family in rural southern Maine. He describes feeling that he was different than others from a young age and that, as he describes it, God made a mistake and he was supposed to be a boy. Yet he pushed those feeling under the rug for a long time. He first came out as gay, and much later he came out as trans in his mid-20s, and …

Farnsworth, Susan, Larisa Filippov

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Susan Farnsworth is a 75 year old lesbian who has lived in Maine for over 50 years. She currently resides in Hallowell, ME, but has lived all over Maine and other places in New England. Farnsworth is an attorney and has her own law practice where she helps a variety of clients with their legal problems. She realized she was a lesbian while she was in law school during her marriage to a man. Farnsworth attended Bates College for her undergraduate degree before going to the University of Maine School of Law in Portland. The multiple political organizations she has …

Zen Internationalism, Zen Revolution: Inoue Shūten, Uchiyama Gudō And The Crisis Of (Zen) Buddhist Modernity In Late Meiji Japan, James Mark Shields

Faculty Contributions to Books

In addition to the birth and development of “Imperial Way Zen,” late Meiji Japan witnessed the emergence of a number of young lay Buddhist scholars, priests and activists who attempted, with varying success, to reframe Buddhism along progressive and occasionally radical political lines. While it is true that groups such as the New Buddhist Fellowship (Shin Bukkyō Dōshikai, 1899–1915) were made up mainly of young men associated with the two branches of the Shin (True Pure Land) sect, several of its members did affiliate themselves with Zen, such as Suzuki Daisetsu (1870–1966) and Inoue Shūten (1880–1945). While the former’s work …

From Post-Pantheism To Trans-Materialism: D. T. Suzuki And New Buddhism, James Mark Shields

Faculty Contributions to Books

In modern Western thought, pantheism remains a powerful if controversial undercurrent. Recent re-evaluations of the work of Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677) point to pantheism’s radical implications for metaphysics, epistemology, ethics and politics. Pantheism (Jp. hanshinron 汎神論) also has significant valence within Japanese Buddhist modernism, particularly in the work of scholars and lay activists who articulated the outlines of a New Buddhism (shin bukkyō 新仏教) from the 1880s through the 1940s. For these thinkers, pantheism provided a “middle way” between materialism and idealism, as well as between theism and atheism. In the postwar period, lapsed radical turned Buddhist Sano Manabu …

Habsburg Ruthenian/Rusyn Identities Part I: The Habsburg Lands, Robert Goodrich

Upper Country: A Journal of the Lake Superior Region

No abstract provided.

American Religion: A Study Of Religious Change From The 1920s Through 1970s, Alexander R. Marks-Katz

Masters Theses

Religion in America persisted along traditional Christian lines until the 1870s. It was then that theological liberalism gained significant headway. The Gilded Age and Progressive Era were still infused with revivals and preachers but there was a growing contingent that challenged the fundamentals of Christian belief. Sometimes this contingent supported revivals but promoted social causes and brought unorthodox biblical interpretations. At other times, they challenged traditional Christianity altogether. By the Great Depression, American culture had undergone such a tremendous amount of change that, faced with adversity, the bottom of religion fell out. Fewer people attended services and contributed funds. More …

Catching The Spirit: The Melrose Ladies Literary And Debating Society 1890-1899, Cynthia L. Patterson

Florida Historical Quarterly

At the January 19, 1894 public dedication of their newly-completed meeting hall, the members of the Melrose Ladies Literary and Debating Society listened attentively while the society president, Mrs. Eliza M. King, recited for a public audience including many of the town's leading citizens, the proud history of the society's first three years. Society secretary, Miss Nellie Glen, also read from a report she had presented previously (privately to club members in February 1893) that in "mid summer of 1890," members of the club, "having caught something of the spirit in this progressive age," met together to plan "some cooperative …

Panic At The Picture Show: Southern Movie Theatre Culture And The Struggle To Desegregate, Susannah L. Broun

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

This paper explores the complex desegregation process of movie theatres in the southern United States. Building off of historiography that investigates regulations of postwar teenage sexuality and recent scholarly work that acknowledges the link between sexuality and civil rights, I argue that movie theatres had a uniquely delayed desegregation process due to perceived sexual intrigue of the dark, private theatre space. Through analysis of drive-in and hardtop theatres, censorship of on-screen content, and youth involvement in desegregation, I contend that anxieties of interracial intimacy and unsupervised teenage sexuality produced this especially prolonged integration process.

Clark Memorandum: Spring 2022, J. Reuben Clark Law School, Byu Law School Alumni Association, J. Reuben Clark Law Society

The Clark Memorandum

• General Joseph Smith and His Candidacy for the Presidency of the United States
• Leadership Lessons from the Life of Dallin H. Oaks
• Flunking the Founding
• Seven Lessons from the Life of Rex Lee