A Cultural History of Work in the Age of Enlightenment: (The Cultural Histories Series)

Winner of the 2020 PROSE Award for Multivolume Reference/Humanities The Enlightenment led to revised ideas about work together with new social attitudes toward work and workers. Coupled with dynamism in the economy, and the rise of the middling orders, work was more frequently perceived positively, as a commodity and as a source of social respectability. This volume explores the cultural implications of the transition from older systems based on privilege, control and embedded practices to a more open society increasingly based on merit and ability. It examines how guild controls broke down and political and commercial systems loosened. It also considers the theoretical justifications that brought new binding ideas, such as the strengthening of ideology on home, domesticity for the female, and work and politics for the male. North America embodied the extremes of these transitions with free workers able to make their way in a society based on ability and initiative while solidifying the ravages of the slavery system. A Cultural History of Work in the Age of Enlightenment presents an overview of the period with essays on economies, representations of work, workplaces, work cultures, technology, mobility, society, politics and leisure.

Table of Contents:
List of Figures General Editors’ Preface Contributor Notes Introduction – Deborah Simonton (University of Southern Denmark, Denmark) 1. The Economy of Work – Carmen Sarasúa (Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain) 2. Picturing Work – Christiana Payne (Oxford Brookes University, UK) 3. Work and Workplaces – Emma Hart (University of St. Andrews, UK) 4. Workplace Cultures – Janine Lanza (Wayne State University, USA) 5. Work, Skill, and Technology – Leonard N. Rosenband (Utah State University, USA) 6. Work and Mobility – Eleonora Canepari (Aix-Marseille University, France) 7. Work and Society – Kyle T. Bulthuis (Utah State University, USA) 8. The Political Culture of Work – Bert De Munck (University of Antwerp, Belgium) 9. Work and Leisure – Emma Griffin (University of East Anglia, UK) Notes Further Readings Index

About the Author :
Anne Montenach is Professor of Early Modern History at Aix-Marseille University, France. She is the co-editor, along with Deborah Leigh Simonton and Marjo Kaartinen, of Luxury and Gender in European Towns, 1700-1914 (2014) and, with Deborah Leigh Simonton, of Gender and Urban Development: Gender in European Towns, 1640-1830 (2013). Deborah Simonton is Associate Professor Emerita of British History at the University of Southern Denmark, Denmark, and Visiting Professor at the University of Turku, Finland. She was also a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Utah State University, USA. She is the author of A History of European Women's Work, 1700 to the present (1998) and Women in European Culture and Society: Gender, Skill and Identity (2011). She is also the editor of the Routledge History of Women in Modern Europe, 1700 to the present (2006).