Sunday, January 07, 2024

The Battle of Alamance of 1771, by Marjoleine Kars - "the interplay of religion and rebellion"

This online introductory lecture for the American Revolution Institute of the Society of Cincinatti (website here) is very interesting – by Marjoleine Kars, then of the University of Maryland and now of MIT. She thinks beyond the usual assumptions of "class conflict, paranoia, or farmer aspirations". At 12:00 she explains – "the farmers quickly figured out that these backcountry elites were using their political offices to enrich themselves at the expense of the great majority of people". And at 19:40 - "I argue that Piedmont farmers found inspiration and justification for their political activism in 'Great Awakening' Protestantism".


Her book on the subject, Breaking Loose Together; The Regulator Rebellion in Pre-Revolutionary North Carolina was published in 2002 by the University of North Carolina Press.




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