Description
Book SynopsisThe book explores the previously under-researched patterns and practices that fashioned a modern consumer society, charting the evolving habits among English men and women across three centuries.
Trade Review'Professor Beverly Lemire has provided a well-argued, solidly researched, and clearly written interpretation of the English material world from pre-industrial to industrial times. This highly accessible study merits close scrutiny by economic and social historians as well as as general readers.'
Michael J. Galgano, James Madison University (Canadian Journal of History)
'Lemire's contribution to… so-called marginal and economic activities, already significant, is further enhanced by this welcome monograph. [an] imaginatively researched study… Lemire has produced an exemplary gender business history'
Katrina Honeyman, University of Leeds (Business History)
'Lemire's discussion of fashion, saving, and accounting is excellent, and the book captures practices that are central to historians' understanding of western culture, but seldom explored in such an engaging way.'
Robin Ganev, University of Regina (Labour/Le Travail)
Labour/Le Travail
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Table of Contents1. Introduction: everyday practice and plebeian affairs
2. Gender, the informal economy and the development of capitalism in England, 1650–1850; or, credit among the common people
3. Credit for the poor and the failed experiment of the charitable corporation, c. 1700–50
4. Shifting currency: the practice and economy of the secondhand trade, c. 1600–1850
5. Refashioning society: expressions of popular consumerism and dress, c. 1660–1820
6. Savings culture, provident consumerism and the advent of modern consumer society, c. 1780–1900
7. Accounting for the household: gender and the culture of household management, c. 1600–1900
8. Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
