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52 Cards in this Set

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class structure

The division of society into recognizable groups. Generally based on wealth, these divisions are also affected by education, family ties, religion, and a variety of other factors recognized by the society in which the divisions exist.

Enlightenment

The intellectual movement that dominated the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in Europe. Believing that the universe operated through natural laws that human beings, using their powers of reason, could understand, "enlightened" thinkers argued that once these laws were understood, people could devise means of living within them. Also called the "Age of Reason," this era was marked by an explosion of activity that brought about significant advances in science (especially natural science), education, and government. Stressing that there were certain "natural rights" (life, liberty, and property) that were given to all people--and that it was the duty of government to protect these rights from selfish individuals (those not allowing reason to control their actions)--philosophers of this age called forth many of the principles that Americans later used in their struggle with Britain. From the Enlightenment came the beliefs that freedom is the natural condition of humanity, that governments should be responsible to the governed, and that it is the right of the people to oppose a government that violates the natural rights of its citizens.

declension

A "falling away from." Puritans of the seventeenth and eighteenth century were deeply concerned about the religious declension in the Massachusetts Bay.

evangelicalism

The adherence to the belief that salvation comes through the personal recognition of one's sins, the awareness of one's inability to save oneself, and the acceptance of Christ as the only means of redemption. The process is usually a highly emotional one that culminates in the rebirth ("born again" state) of the sinner and his or her acceptance as one of the evangelical community of believers. The evangelical emphasis on the spiritual rather than the worldly was particularly appealing to the lower classes and to others (for example, women and slaves) who sought a means to affirm their personal worth. This often put evangelicals at odds with their social "betters," who regarded the evangelicals' rejection of those things that defined the social classes (fine dress, leisure activities, civil and religious ceremonies, and such) as an attack on the status and authority of ruling elites.

jeremiads

Sermons of despair preached by ministers in the face of waning piety. The jeremiad is a longstanding religious and literary genre used throughout history.

nuclear family

The social unit composed of father, mother, and children.

paper money in the colonies

In an effort to overcome the lack of money in America, some colonial governments issued paper money to serve as currency. The problem, however, was to get the colonists to accept these paper bills at face value. So, to keep the bills from declining in value, some colonies employed a system (currency finance) in which paper money would be issued for only a specific purpose (for example, to buy goods that the government needed, to pay for services to the government, and so on) and would be accepted by the government, at face value, as payment for taxes or other debts owed to the colony. It was generally hoped that this would be the only exchange and that the money would not circulate; but if it did, the fact that the government would accept it as full payment was believed to be enough to keep it from depreciating greatly. In practice, however, the system did not work. The bills lost their value as they circulated, creating the inflation that opponents of paper money feared. Nevertheless, under a more controlled situation, the concept was indeed workable and, with some changes, is used today.

patriarchal

Having to do with a social system in which the father is the head of the family.

primogeniture

The practice of passing all inherited property to one’s firstborn son.

slavery

A legal status in which an individual is owned by another individual who controls his or her actions and benefits from his or her labor. The status is for life (unless altered by the owner) and is inherited, usually through the mother.

staple crop

The primary export (cash) crop of a region, the crop on which the region's economy rests. In the Chesapeake colonies, the staple was tobacco; farther south, it was rice or indigo. In later years, sugar (the staple in the Indies) was important in some areas on the mainland, but in time the classic staple--cotton--came to dominate the South's economy.

Indentured Servitude

A labor system whereby young people paid for their passage to the New World by working for an employer for a certain number of years normally 5 years. It was widely employed in the 18th century in the British colonies in North America and elsewhere. It was especially used as a way for poor youth in Britain and the German states to get passage to the American colonies. They would work for a fixed number of years, then be free to work on their own. The employer purchased the indenture from the sea captain who brought the youths over; he did so because he needed labor. Some worked as farmers or helpers for farm wives, some were apprenticed to craftsmen. Both sides were legally obligated to meet the terms, which were enforced by local American courts. Runaways were sought out and returned. About half of the white immigrants to the American colonies in the 17th and 18th centuries were indentured.

Humoralism

A system of medicine detailing the makeup and workings of the human body, adopted by the Indian Ayurveda system of medicine, Ancient Greek and Roman physicians and philosophers, positing that an excess or deficiency of any of four distinct bodily fluids in a person — known as humors or humours — directly influences their temperament and health.

The Middle Passage

The long journey of slaves from Africa to the new world. The stage of the triangular trade in which millions of Africans were shipped to the New World as part of the Atlantic slave trade.

Slave Codes

Early 18th century laws granting white masters in colonial America absolute authority over black slaves. These laws defined the status of slaves and the rights and responsibilities of slave owners.

Huguenots

French Calvinists. They were French Protestants inspired by the writings of John Calvin. Many were driven to America seeking religious freedom when in 1685 the Edict of Nantes (1598) was revoked.

The Palatinate

A region in Southwestern Germany. It occupies more than a quarter of the German federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate. Historically in union with Bavaria. The Pennsylvania Dutch are a cultural group formed by early German-speaking immigrants from this area to Pennsylvania and their descendants.

"Pennsylvania Dutch"

Germany laws banning Protestantism drove these Germans to America where they settled in Pennsylvania.

Saugus works

First ironworks in the United States, north of Boston, a business failure. It was the first integrated ironworks in North America, founded by John Winthrop the Younger and in operation between 1646 and approximately 1670.

Peter Hasenclever

Ran the first successful ironworks in the States, founded in 1764. He controlled the largest metal industrial enterprise in English North America, located in New Jersey, suffered from inadequate labor supply, small domestic market, and energy supply.

Iron Act of 1750

One of the legislative measures introduced by the British Parliament, seeking to restrict manufacturing activities in British colonies, particularly in North America, and encourage manufacture to take place in Great Britain.

"triangular trade"

Simplification of rum, slaves, sugar trade network. The trade in the 18th and 19th centuries that involved shipping goods from Britain to West Africa to be exchanged for slaves, these slaves being shipped to the West Indies and exchanged for sugar, rum, and other commodities, which were in turn shipped back to Britain.

Stono Rebellion

Failed 1739 slave revolt in South Carolina. It was the largest slave uprising in the British mainland colonies, with 21 whites and 44 blacks killed. The uprising was led by native Africans who were likely from the Central African Kingdom of Kongo. Some of the rebels spoke Portuguese. Their leader, Jemmy (referred to in some reports as "Cato", and probably a slave belonging to the Cato, or Cater, family who lived just off the Ashley River and north of the Stono River), was a literate slave who led 20 other enslaved Kongolese, who may have been former soldiers, in an armed march south from the Stono River (for which the rebellion is named).

Town Meeting

Primary form of local government in New England, held in churches

Selectmen

The executive arm of the government of New England towns in the United States. The board typically consists of three or five members, with or without staggered terms. Three is the most common number, historically. Ran the town's affairs.

Salem Witch Trials

A series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. The trials resulted in the executions of twenty people, most of them women.

The Great Awakening

Religious revival reaching its peak in 1740. Characterized by widespread revivals led by evangelical Protestant ministers, a sharp increase of interest in religion, a profound sense of conviction and redemption on the part of those affected, an increase in evangelical church membership, and the formation of new religious movements and denominations.

John and Charles Wesley

Founders of Methodism, visited Georgia in 1730s

George Whitefield

An English Anglican cleric who helped spread the Great Awakening in Britain and, especially, in the American colonies. An open-air preacher made several evangelizing tours in the colonies.

Jonathan Edwards

New England Congregationalist preacher from Northampton, Massachusetts, preached anew the traditional Puritan ideas of the absolute sovereignty of God and predestination. Terrified his listeners.

New Lights

Great Awakening era Revivalists... Wesley and Whitefield

Old Lights

Great Awakening era traditionalists... Edwards

The Enlightenment

Intellectual movement celebrating rational thought and natural laws

Natural Law

A philosophy of law that is supposedly determined by nature, and so is universal. Classically, natural law refers to the use of reason to analyze human nature — both social and personal — and deduce binding rules of moral behavior from it. Natural law is often contrasted with the positive law of a given political community, society, or state.

Poor Richard's Almanac

America's most famous yearly almanac, written by Benjamin Franklin who adopted the pseudonym of "Poor Richard" or "Richard Saunders" for this purpose.

Publick Occurrences

The title of the first multi-page newspaper published in the Americas. The first edition was published September 25, 1690, in Boston, Massachusetts.

"dame schools"

An early form of a private elementary school in the colonies. They were usually taught by women (widows or unmarried women) and were often located in the home of the teacher.

Harvard College

First American college founded in 1636 Cambridge, Massachusetts by Puritans theologians who wanted to create a training center for ministers.

William and Mary College

College established in 1693 in Williamsburg, Virginia by Anglicans.

Royal Society of London

The leading British scientific organization of the enlightenment

Benjamin Franklin

Preeminent statesman and enlightenment scientist of America who won international fame through his experiments with electricity.

John Peter Zenger

A German American printer and journalist in New York City. He printed the outspoken The New York Weekly Journal which criticized the local governor who in turn shut down the newspapers. The most dramatic confrontation came in New York in 1734, where the governor brought him to trial for criminal libel after the publication of satirical attacks. The jury acquitted him, who became the iconic American hero for freedom of the press.

Cotton Mather

He left a scientific legacy due to his hybridization experiments and his promotion of inoculation for disease prevention especially Smallpox in Boston.

Royal African Company

A mercantile company set up by the Stuart family and London merchants to trade along the west coast of Africa. However, it was soon engaged in the slave trade as well as with other commodities.

"visible saints"

This was central to the Puritan purification campaign. Puritans believed that individuals could prove in their daily lives that they were part of God’s chosen, or predestined, to receive salvation. Wholesome living and financial success would be visible signs of being one of God’s elect, otherwise referred to as sainthood.

life expectancy

Life expectancy was under 25 years in the early Colony of Virginia, and in seventeenth-century New England, about 40 per cent died before reaching adulthood.

sex ratio

In New England, the sex ratio was relatively even, with men outnumbering women three to two in the first generation. But in New Netherlands, there were two men for every one female and the ratio was six to one in the Chesapeake. Whereas the New England population became self-sustaining as early as the 1630s, New Jersey and Pennsylvania did not achieve this until the 1660s to the 1680s and Virginia until after 1700

midwifery

Played an essential role in the birth process in colonial America. The community held colonial midwives in high esteem. Midwives of this era, were apprentice-trained, older, married women who had several of their own children and combined running a household with her midwifery practice. In addition, she treated the sick and knew how to make her own medicines.

British Navigation Acts of 1651

These Acts were designed to tighten the government's control over trade between England, its colonies, and the rest of the world. The Acts' main provisions were as follows:


1. Imported goods from non-English America had to arrive in England and her colonies in English ships.


2. England's American colonies could only export their goods in English ships.


3. Imported goods from Europe had to arrive in England and her colonies either in English ships or in ships that came directly from the producing country.


4. English ships were defined as those owned by Englishmen (including English colonists).

"salutary neglect"

The colonies were left to manage many of their own affairs. The Navigation Acts were not strictly enforced.

The First Continental Congress 1774

A meeting of delegates from twelve of the thirteen colonies that met on September 5 to October 26, 1774 at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, early in the American Revolution. Independence was NOT the main concern of this meeting. Hoped to find a solution with the British.

"Common Law"

An unwritten set of practices and legal traditions that were subject to change.