Browsing by Author "Becker, Gertrude Harrington"
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- The Classics and the Broader Public in Philadelphia, 1783-1788: Avenues for EngagementDowrey, Alexandra E. (Virginia Tech, 2014-06-02)In early Philadelphia, 1783-1788, the classics formed a pervasive presence on the city's cultural, political, and physical landscape. As the American nation commenced its republican experiment, references to the classics in Philadelphia especially emerged as a vehicle and vocabulary employed by statesmen for fashioning a people, political culture, and national identity. According to political theories of republicanism, statesmen in Philadelphia had a vested interest in cultivating the virtue of their citizens. As symbols and lessons in patriotism and virtue, classical antiquity was incorporated into civic iconography and national foundation narratives and projected to the broader public. This thesis examines the classical presence in Philadelphia, 1783-1788. It specifically analyses the public presentation and dissemination of the classics in three cultural avenues beyond the walls of the academy, newspapers, spectacles, and orations, in order to evaluate the barriers and opportunities for engagement with the classics by the broader Philadelphia public. I argue that although the gates to a traditional higher education were shut to many of the Philadelphia public, cultural avenues existed that allowed the classics to disseminate to the wider populace. The broader public was invited to engage with the classics when it served a political purpose and lessons in patriotism and virtue were being transmitted. However, this inclusion was often controlled, mediated, and implemented on the terms of the elite. Further, the classics still served as markers of status, and the two contradictory functions held by the classics placed the wider Philadelphia public on the threshold of inclusion and exclusion.
- "The Painful Task of Thinking Belongs To Me:" Rethinking Royal Navy Signal Reform during the American War of IndependenceOlex, Benjamin F. (Virginia Tech, 2021-06-08)This thesis examines the context and causes of signal reform in the British Royal Navy during the American War of Independence. It argues that changes in the ethos of the officer corps before and during the American War of Independence led to a complex period of signal reform. The original system was tied to the General Printed Sailing and Fighting Instructions, more often referred to as the Fighting Instructions. For around a century (ca. 1690 to ca. 1790), the Royal Navy utilized the Fighting Instructions as its main system of communication. During the American War for Independence, however, some sea officers began to question the system and devise new methods of signaling. This change was brought on by changes within the officer corps. Among the changes were trends of centralization and the influence of Enlightenment ideals. Both of these shifts helped to inspire the signal reformers, while also creating the environment to sustain signal reforms. This thesis examines the signal reforms of the three principal signal reformers of the war: Richard Howe, Richard Kempenfelt, and George Rodney.
- Patrick County, Virginia and the Civil War, 1860-1880Becker, Gertrude Harrington (Virginia Tech, 1990-11-14)In 1860, Patrick County. like the rest of Virginia and much of the South. wavered uneasily on the brink of secession. In a county where large planters were few, secession was not overwhelmingly popular. Slaveholding families, however, constituted almost one quarter of the white population in Patrick, as they did across the South, and when Virginia seceded. Patrick Countians flocked to serve in the Confederate Army. Although situated in Virginia, Patrick managed to escape physical decimation from war. In fact, no battles occurred in the county and Federal troops only invaded the county once in four years. Nevertheless, the Civil War came home to Patrick in a variety of ways: men were killed, livestock and crops impressed, and farms destroyed. With its prosperity of the 1850's disrupted by the war. Patrick's agricultural output dramatically decreased, industry failed, and labor shortages ensued. Despite the changes the Civil War brought to Patrick, the highest echelon of Patrick's social structure changed little. Those white men who had been well off before the war continued to flourish and continued to own the most and most valuable real estate. Small farmers before the war generally remained small farmers. Free blacks did not gain much status over the decades, and freedmen owned scarcely any land nor personal property; neither group by 1880 had achieved literacy. In Patrick County the rich stayed rich and the planters remained the most influential.
- Religious Practices in Classical ThebesMartin, Kaitlyn Renay (Virginia Tech, 2019-07-02)My thesis uses Thebes as case study to focus on Theban religious practices during the Classical age (traditionally defined as between 510 BCE and 323 BCE). By narrowing my study to this geographical and chronological scope, my research aims to add to the traditional narrative of Theban history by focusing on religious history rather than the political or military. More particularly, by using both literature (Classical Greek tragedies) as well as material culture found in exceptional religious settings of the Thesmophoria and Kabeirion, I strive to delineate some of the religious practices taking place in the polis of Thebes during the Classical age. While the Theban tragedies provide a view of religion from a broader perspective, the material evidence of the festival of the Thesmophoria and the rites to the Kabeiroi provide a glimpse into the practices of Theban religion that lie outside the traditional, Olympian pantheon. I argue that studying Theban literature and votive offerings in tandem can provide a perspective at the micro-level of Greek religion that can be expanded in order to understand the religious landscape of ancient Greece on a much deeper and richer level.