In Cultural Revolutions, Leora Auslander takes a highly original approach to the significance of the political changes wrought by the English Civil War (1642-1651), the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783), and the French Revolution (1789-1799). This broadly conceived yet succinct essay advances a new argument: that these three revolutions were not bourgeois in character but were revolutions of culture that led to a transformation of the ways societies could be politicized. Auslander argues that these revolutions conferred new importance upon the symbols of state and upon the cultural components of our everyday lives—the clothes that cover our bodies, the food we eat, and the songs and plays to which we turn for distraction and insight.

Copub: Berg Publishers

Leora Auslander is Professor of History and Founding Director of the Center of Gender Studies at the University of Chicago. She is the author of Taste and Power: Furnishing Modern France (UC Press).

“This book is refreshingly original in its interpretation of the significance of the political events.”—French Review

“Cultural Revolutions would make a wonderful foundation from which to build an undergraduate or graduate course.”—Jrnl of World History

“The strength of this work lies in its ability to distill incredibly detailed and sometimes highly theoretical works and ideas into a readable, and comprehensible overview.”—Canadian Jrnl of History

“Scholars of material culture and comparative revolution will find much to value in this work.”—The Historian

“Important insights.”—American Studies Journal

“Recommended.”—Choice

"Auslander's emphasis on the power of 'things' as a motor of historical change permits her to present a refreshingly new set of arguments about well known historical events."—Denise Z. Davidson, author of France After Revolution: Urban Life, Gender, and the New Social Order

"This lucidly written book brilliantly merges material culture firmly into political history, and enriches both. Leora Auslander's original interpretation of changing gender relations in the age of the democratic revolutions offers fresh ways to understand the emotional and political work that has shaped national identity and persists into our own time. A remarkable accomplishment."—Linda K. Kerber, author of No Constitutional Right to Be Ladies: Women and the Obligations of Citizenship