Distant Strangers by James Vernon
What does it mean to live in the modern world? How different is that world from those that preceded it, and when did we become modern? In Distant Strangers, James Vernon argues that the world was made modern not by revolution, industrialization, or the Enlightenment. Instead, he shows how in Britain, a place long held to be the crucible of modernity, a new and distinctly modern social condition emerged by the middle of the nineteenth century. Rapid and sustained population growth, combined with increasing mobility of people over greater distances and concentrations of people in cities, created a society of strangers. Vernon explores how individuals in modern societies adapted to live among strangers by forging more abstract and anonymous economic, social, and political relations, as well as by reanimating the local and the personal.
"Commands-and deserves to command-the attention of scholars" -- Martin Hewitt American Historical Review "This is a project of great scope and ambition... [Vernon's] book ought to enthuse, stimulate, provoke." Journal of Modern History
James Vernon is professor of history at UC Berkeley. He is author or editor of several books including, most recently, Hunger: A Modern History and The Peculiarities of Liberal Modernity in Imperial Britain (UCP/GAIA, 2011), and is coeditor of the Berkeley Series in British Studies.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780520282049 |
| ISBN 10 | 0520282043 |
| Title | Distant Strangers |
| Author | James Vernon |
| Series | Berkeley Series In British Studies |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | University of California Press |
| Year published | 2014-08-01 |
| Number of pages | 184 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |