The Oxford Handbook of the American Revolution

The Oxford Handbook of the American Revolution draws on a wealth of new scholarship to create a vibrant dialogue among varied approaches to the revolution that made the United States. In thirty-three essays written by authorities on the period, the Handbook brings to life the diverse multitudes of colonial North America and their extraordinary struggles before, during, and after the eight-year-long civil war that secured the independence of thirteen rebel colonies from their erstwhile colonial parent. The chapters explore battles and diplomacy, economics and finance, law and culture, politics and society, gender, race, and religion. Its diverse cast of characters includes ordinary farmers and artisans, free and enslaved African Americans, Indians, and British and American statesmen and military leaders. In addition to expanding the Revolution's who, the Handbook broadens its where, portraying an event that far transcended the boundaries of what was to become the United States. It offers readers an American Revolution whose impact ranged far beyond the thirteen colonies. The Handbook's range of interpretive and methodological approaches captures the full scope of current revolutionary-era scholarship. Its authors, British and American scholars spanning several generations, include social, cultural, military, and imperial historians, as well as those who study politics, diplomacy, literature, gender, and sexuality. Together and separately, these essays demonstrate that the American Revolution remains a vibrant and inviting a subject of inquiry. Nothing comparable has been published in decades.

About the Author

Edward G. Gray is professor of history at Florida State University. His previous books include The Making of John Ledyard: Empire and Ambition in the Life of an Early American Traveler and New World Babel: Languages and Nations in Early America . Jane Kamensky is Professor of History and Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Director of the Schlesinger Library at Harvard University. Her previous books include The Exchange Artist: A Tale of High-Flying Speculation and America's First Banking Collapse and Governing the Tongue: The Politics of Speech in Early New England.