Work and Revolution in France: The Language of Labor from the Old Regime to 1848 - Softcover

Sewell Jr, William H.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521299519 ISBN 13: 9780521299510

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1980

Synopsis

Work and Revolution in France is particularly appropriate for students of French history interested in the crucial revolutions that took place in 1789, 1830, and 1848. Sewell has reconstructed the artisans' world from the corporate communities of the old regime, through the revolutions in 1789 and 1830, to the socialist experiments of 1848. Research has revealed that the most important class struggles took place in craft workshops, not in 'dark satanic mills'. In the 1830s and 1840s, workers combined the collectivism of the corporate guild tradition with the egalitarianism of the revolutionary tradition, producing a distinct artisan form of socialism and class consciousness that climaxed in the Parisian Revolution of 1848. The book follows artisans into their everyday experience of work, fellowship, and struggles and places their history in the context of wider political, economic, and social developments. Sewell analyzes the 'language of labor' in the broadest sense, dealing not only with what the workers and others wrote and said about labour but with the whole range of institutional conventions, economic practices, social struggles, ritual gestures, customs, and actions that gave the workers' world a comprehensive shape.

About this title

Book Description

Sewell synthesizes the material on the social history of the French labor movement from its formative period to the first half of the 19th century. Centers on the Revolutions of 1789, 1830 and 1848.

Review

'This is one of the rare books that succeed in marrying ideas and events, respecting the autonomy of each, and examining their influence upon each other in a thoroughly convincing way. It's interest therefore transcends its immediate subject and it should appeal to anyone concerned about how things happen in history. At the same time it provides a lucid and original account of the evolution of the French urban worker artisan, through sans-culotte, to class-conscious proletarian ... It is an important book that students are going to need - and enjoy - for a long time to come.' Norman Hampson, University of York

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1980
• ISBN 10: 0521299519
• ISBN 13: 9780521299510
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 352