Rudeness and Civility

About

John F. Kasson writes of the deep tensions created by the demands of democracy, the pressures of an expanding market economy, and the desire for social distinction. He re-creates the deferential and often coarse society of colonial years, then its transformation as aspirations and social forms earlier restricted to the gentry became popularized. The rapidly industrializing economy most intensively affected the booming cities. Etiquette advisers sought to instruct the rising middle class in ways of egalitarianism: how to present oneself at home and in public; how to express pleasure and affections and suppress anger and conflict; how to conduct oneself with decorum at a concert or theatrical performance. Mr. Kasson examines a host of diverse topics, from the “lost art of hat tipping” to the rise of the table fork and how to behave at table, to the writings of Poe, Melville, and William James. “Rudeness and Civility” is a rare book that is insightful and entertaining: it will make readers think about our changing manners in a fresh way. — From publisher’s description.