voices_book_3 Flashcards
(33 cards)
American civil war
a conflict between southern and northern states in America, 18615. A confederacy of southern states wanted to separate from the north in protest at President Lincoln_s plans to limit slavery. This secession was considered to be a rebellion by the north and war ensued. In Britain many liberals supported Lincoln_s wish to end slavery, though some aristocrats sympathised with the slave owners objection to government interference.
Anti-Corn Law League
a movement campaigning against the Corn Laws. The movement was dominated by manufacturing interests and was largely led from Manchester. It achieved success in 1846 when the Corn Laws were repealed.
capitalism
an economic system in which individuals are free to own the means of production and use them to maximise profits. Under capitalism, the distribution of resources is largely left to market competition.
Chartists
members of the movement Chartism, a movement for the reform of Parliament, which was active in the 1830s and 1840s. Its goal was the six points of the People_s Charter: universal male suffrage; equal electoral districts; a secret ballot; annual elections; no property qualification for Members of Parliament; and payment of Members of Parliament. Chartism attracted mass support, chiefly among the working class(es). A number of huge petitions were presented to Parliament.
Corn Laws
a duty imposed on grain imports which kept prices high by imposing a duty on imports whenever the domestic price of grain fell below a fixed level. The Corn Laws were designed to protect landowners and farmers against cheap foreign grain. They, therefore, benefited rural areas and landowners as opposed to cities and grain consumers. The Corn Laws were repealed in 1846 following the successful campaign of the Anti-Corn Law League.
didactic
intended to instruct or teach.
electoral reform
in the early nineteenth century only a small minority of men could vote for Members of Parliament. During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a series of Electoral Reform Acts gradually extended the franchise. The most important were those of 1832, 1867 and 1918. Under the 1832 Act, most middle-class men were given the vote and some of the most blatant anomalies were removed. In 1867 many urban working-class men were admitted to the franchise. However, it was not until the 1918 Act that all men and most women won the vote (the age qualification for women was higher until 1928).
Evangelical churches
Protestant churches that believe in the authority of the Bible. They are part of a nonconformist tradition that eschews the traditions and practices of the established Anglican Church and bases its teachings directly on the Bible. Evangelicalism was a key part of urban middle-class identity in the nineteenth century.
Factory Acts
legislation that limited the hours that women and children could work in factories. Acts also attempted to regulate conditions in factories by subjecting them to inspection.
identity
this is used to signify what makes individuals the same as, or different from, other people. Identifying markers include characteristics such as gender, class and race. Historians look at language to see how people in the past define themselves in relation to other people. As such, identity is used to look at the relationship between individuals and social groups.
Irish Famine
major famine in Ireland in the 1840s. The immediate cause of the famine was the potato blight, which destroyed the potato crop in 1845 and 1846. However, Ireland was particularly vulnerable because of the extreme dependence of the impoverished rural population on the potato crop. The landowning class and the British administration failed to provide adequate relief and around one million people died.
Liberal
a person who adheres to liberalism, a political philosophy whose supporters believe in the rights and freedom of the individual. Nineteenth-century liberalism was closely associated with the values of the industrial middle class. It promoted free trade, political economy and freedom from government interference. The Liberal Party developed from the Whigs, in a bid to balance the aristocratic and industrial interests of the party after the Reform Act of 1832.
Marxism
a political and economic theory based on the ideas of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, and developed by their followers. Marxism provides the intellectual foundation for Communism.
mechanics_ institutes
adult education establishments, originally focusing on scientific and technical subjects. However, their scope was broad and they often housed important libraries, hosted lecture courses on a range of subjects, and catered for the needs of mainly working-class people studying in their spare time.
omniscient
the term omniscient when applied to a narrator literally means that the narrator is all-knowing. Fictional works written in the third person often employ an omniscient narrator, who is capable of telling the reader the unspoken thoughts and feelings of characters in the narrative, and able to anticipate events.
pauper
someone with no means of livelihood who is dependent on others. The term was much used in the nineteenth century to describe people who came into contact with the Poor Law.
political economy
a term used in the first half of the nineteenth century for a new way of viewing economics which emphasised supply and demand. Political economists were keen to see economics as a rational process, subject to natural laws.
Poor Law
the system to provide relief to the poor. The costs of the system rose dramatically in the early nineteenth century as poor harvests, wars, and an increasingly commercial agriculture pushed more rural workers into poverty. In 1834 a new Poor Law was introduced to try to limit demand. Under the new system, a distinction was made between those unable to work and the able-bodied, who were only to be provided with relief in workhouses. These were designed to be so unattractive that independent work was always preferred.
proletariat
wage earners, those without property. The term is from ancient Rome, but was used by Engels and Marx to mean the working class(es).
realism
a mode of writing that appears to render actual life as authentically as possible. It depends on literary conventions such as close, accurate description and largely unobtrusive methods of narration. A secondary meaning of realism relates to subject matter that is everyday and unheroic. As a critical term, realism is particularly associated with nineteenth-century fiction, but it is a wide-ranging and complex concept, used in discussion of other literary genres (especially drama) and in other periods.
rhetoric
the use of artfully constructed language, designed to persuade an audience.
Robert Owen
(1771_1858) a socialist who used his wealth and knowledge of business to promote the philanthropic management of factories. He built cooperative communities that experimented with communal ways of living and working. He is considered one of the founders of the socialist movement in Britain.
romance
a term that refers to a long literary tradition reaching back to medieval tales (such as stories of Arthurian knights) through to fantasy genres of various kinds. The fictional characters who populate romances are usually idealised, settings are often remote, and events subject to supernatural interventions.
satire
the use of exaggeration to expose faults and failings (either individual or social). Satire is often humorous, but its main purpose is to ridicule or deride.
