Protestant identities : religion, society, and self-fashioning in post-Reformation England

Bibliographic Information

Protestant identities : religion, society, and self-fashioning in post-Reformation England

edited by Muriel C. McClendon, Joseph P. Ward, Michael MacDonald

Stanford University Press, c1999

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Includes bibliographical references and index

Description and Table of Contents

Description

This book explores the complex ways in which England's gradual transformation from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant nation presented men and women with new ways in which to fashion their own identities and to define their relationships with society. The past generation's research into the religious history of early modern England has heightened our appreciation for the persistence of traditional beliefs in the face of concerted attacks by followers of Henry VIII and his successor Edward VI. The book argues that the present challenge for historians is to move beyond this revisionist characterization of the English Reformation as a largely unpopular and unsuccessful exercise of state power to assess its legacy of increasing religious diversification. The contributors cast a post-revisionist light on religious change by showing how the Henrician break with Rome and the Edwardian implementation of a Protestant agenda had a lasting influence on the laity's beliefs and practices, forging a legacy that Mary I's efforts to restore Catholicism could not overturn. If, as revisionist research has stressed, late medieval Christianity provided the laity with a wide array of means with which to internalize and individualize their religious experiences, then surely the events of the reigns of Henry and Edward vastly expanded the field over which the religiosity of English men and women could range. This book addresses the unfolding consequences of this theological variegation to assess how individual spiritual beliefs, aspirations, and practices helped shape social and political action on a family, local, and national level.

Table of Contents

  • Introduction Muriel C. McClendon and Joseph P. Ward
  • Part I. Passion and Practice: 1. Different kinds of speaking: symbolic violence and secular iconoclasm in early modern England David Cressy
  • 2. Conversion and its consequences in the life and letters of Nicholas Sheterden Thomas R. Holien
  • 3. The kingdom of Christ, the kingdom of England, and the kingdom of Traske David R. Como
  • Part II. Diffusion and the Limits of Appropriation: 4. The mental world of Sir Richard Berkeley J. Sears McGee
  • 5. 'Prudentia ultra Sexum': Lady Jane Bacon and the management of her families Felicity Heal and Clive Holmes
  • 6. 'Good works' and social ties: helping the migrant poor in early modern England Ilana Krausman Ben-Amos
  • 7. Godliness, commemoration, and community: the management of provincial schools by London Trade Guilds Joseph P. Ward
  • 8. Remembering the Puritan past: John Walker and Anglican memories of the English civil war Burke W. Griggs
  • Part III. Religion and Locality: 9. Reconsidering the Marian persecution: the urban context Muriel C. McClendon
  • 10. The 'Great Persecution' reconsidered: the Irish Quakers and the Ethic of suffering Richard L. Greaves
  • 11. Local politics in restoration England: religion, culture and politics in Oliver Heywood's halifax John Smail
  • 12. 'Born of My Land': identity, community and faith among the Welsh in early modern London Katherine W. Swett
  • 13. Separate Spheres? ideology and practice in London gender relations, 1660-1740 Robert B. Shoemaker
  • Notes
  • Index.

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