Learning to Behave: A Guide to American Conduct Books Before 1900

Front Cover
Bloomsbury Academic, May 25, 1994 - History - 248 pages

A popular genre from colonial times to 1900, the conduct book provides the youthful reader with authoritative guidance about right moral, religious, and gender role behavior. With the aim of teaching the young what they need to know--and believe--about society's expectations for the ideal young man and woman, the genre codified true American manhood and womanhood. Until now, conduct books have been mixed in and cataloged with books on manners, etiquette, education, religion, or success. This guide provides an analytic and historical overview of the conduct book as a genre and its cultural work in America. With an annotated bibliography of over 500 books, it is the first work to provide scholars interested in studying the cultural stance, intent, and importance of conduct-of-life texts with easy access to conduct books.

The book provides an extensive overview of the conduct book, with separate chapters on the development of conduct books for children, men, and women. The fully annotated bibliography, which lists the conduct books by their intended audience, includes 196 conduct books for children, 142 texts for young men, 188 titles for young women, and 57 texts for adults of either sex. In addition, the work includes a short selected bibliography of secondary sources and an index. This guide opens the genre for further study.

From inside the book

 

Contents

Introduction
1
Conduct Books for Children
13
Conduct Books for Men
43
Copyright

8 other sections not shown

Other editions - View all

Learning to Behave: A Guide to American Conduct Books Before 1900
Sarah E Newton
No preview available - 1994

Common terms and phrases

Advice to Young American Sunday-School Union American Tract Society amusements anecdote behavior Boston boys chapters child companions conduct advice conduct books conduct literature conduct principles conduct texts conduct topics conduct writers Cotton Mather courtesy book courtship Crocker & Brewster CSmH CU-B dangers Daughters DLC Author domestic Duty of Woman early essays etiquette example Familiar tone Father fiction Franklin Friend gender genre girls habits Happiness Harvey Newcomb Hester Chapone husband ideal importance industry instruction James Janeway John Lady's Lectures to Young lessons Letters Library Lydia Sigourney manhood marriage Mary Mathew Carey MCR-WA moral mother nature nineteenth century obedience Philadelphia piety popular precepts Printed published readers reading religion religious Sabbath School sermons sexes social sphere story Strong Christian emphasis success Susanna Rowson temperance temptations Topics include virtues warns wife William womanhood York Young Ladies Young Man's Young Women youth

About the author (1994)

SARAH E. NEWTON is professor of English and American Studies at California State University, Chico. She has published articles on early American fiction and American folklore, and is currently working on a collection of 18th- and 19th-century moral stories for American children and a critical anthology of American women nature writers.

Bibliographic information

TitleLearning to Behave: A Guide to American Conduct Books Before 1900
Bibliographies and Indexes in American History
AuthorSarah E Newton
Editionillustrated, annotated
PublisherBloomsbury Academic, 1994
ISBN0313267529, 9780313267529
Length248 pages
Subjects ›  › 

History / Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies)
History / United States / 19th Century
  
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