Fighting words : working-class formation, collective action, and discourse in early nineteenth-century England / Marc W. Steinberg.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Steinberg, Marc W. (Marc William), 1956-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Working class--England--History--19th century.

Working class.

Social conflict.

History.

England.

Social conflict--England--History--19th century.

Physical Description:

xviii, 286 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Ithaca, N.Y. : Cornell University Press, 1999.

Summary:

A key component of social life, discourse mediates the processes of class formation and social conflict. Drawing on dialogic theory and building on the work of E. P. Thompson, Marc W. Steinberg argues for the importance of incorporating discursive analysis into the historical reconstruction of class experience. Amending models of collective action, he offers new insights on how discourse shapes the dynamics of popular protest. To support his thesis, he presents studies of two English trade groups fighting economic subordination and degradation in the 1820s: cotton spinners from Lancashire factory towns and London silk weavers.

Contents:

Preliminaries

Introduction: Theoretical and Historigraphical Considerations 1

1 Patterns of English Labor Contention in the Early Nineteenth Century 23

2 A Tale of Two Areas 36

Spitalfields

3 The Silk Trade: Memory, Market, and Means of Production 49

4 Local Political Culture: From Reciprocity to Hegemony 67

5 The Repeal of the Spitalfields Acts 87

6 Post-Repeal Collective Actions: Battling the Hydra of Degradation 101

Ashton-Stalybridge

7 King Cotton: Markets, Mills, and Mechanics 129

8 Class Structure, Class Cultures, and Social Lives 151

9 Local Political Culture: The Stranglehold of Wealth 167

10 The Vitriol of Conflict 187

11 Class War: The Spinners' Strikes of 1830-1831 206

12 Class Formation, Collective Action, and the Role of Discourse 229

Appendix 1. Spitalfields weavers' collective actions, c. 1825-1831 243

Appendix 2. Ashton and Stalybridge spinners' collective actions, April 1830

January 1831 247.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 249-276) and index.

ISBN:

080143582X

OCLC:

40684104