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The Lyceum And Public Culture In The Nineteenth-Century United States (Rhetoric and Public Affairs) | 
| Author: Angela G. Ray
Publisher: Michigan State University Press
Category: Book
Buy New: $79.95
New (7) Used (2) from $79.95
Avg. Customer Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 1545542
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 371
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.8
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.4
ISBN: 087013745X
Dewey Decimal Number: 374.22097309034
EAN: 9780870137457
ASIN: 087013745X
Publication Date: June 15, 2005
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 1 to 3 weeks
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Angela Ray provides a refreshing new look at the lyceum lecture system as it developed in the United States from the 1820s to the 1880s. She argues that the lyceum contributed to the creation of an American "public" at a time when the country experienced a rapid change in land area, increasing immigration, and a revolution in transportation, communication technology, and social roles. The history of the lyceum in the nineteenth century illustrates a process of expansion, diffusion, and eventual commercialization. In the late 1820s, a politically and economically dominant culture - the white Protestant northeastern middle class - institutionalized the practice of public debating and public lecturing for education and moral uplift. In the 1820s and 1830s the lyceum was characterized by organized groups in cities and towns, particularly in the Northeast and the Old Northwest (now the Midwest). These groups were established to promote debate, to create a setting for study, and to provide a forum for members' lecturing. By the 1840s and 1850s, however, most lyceums concentrated on the sponsorship of public lectures, presented for institutional profit as well as public instruction and entertainment. Eventually, lyceum lectures became a commercial enterprise and desirable platform for celebrities who wished to expand their incomes from lecturing.
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| Customer Reviews:
Only Serious Study July 24, 2008
This is the only really serious study of the Lyceum in American culture. I think Merle Curti would have been proud to mention this study in his "Growth of American Thought" where he bemoans the fact that no satis-
factory study of the Lyceum movement exists in 1951. But even today there is a surprising dearth of serious studies. So, Prof. Ray deserves all the admiration for a job well done!
Lyceum in forming American popular culture and its interests August 3, 2005
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
The word "lyceum" is a Latin word with a Greek derivative that was a name for the god of the sun. The association with classical learning and culture and the "enlightening" the audience of lyceum events would undergo were intentional. The idea of the lyceum in America arose in the early 1800s as a means to provide common knowledge and ideas, or at least some common experiences, for the population of an America that was expanding geographically, changing demographically from large numbers of immigrants, and engaging with the early phases of industrialism and new inventions such as the steamboat. Lyceums throughout the U. S., including frontier areas, were seen by both promoters and audiences as matrixes for unity and communication for the increasingly complex democratic society. In spite of the high-mindedness and vision of their originators, it wasn't long before lyceums were holding circus-like entertainments and other events straying from their intended purposes. But lyceums drew large local audiences wherever they were held, inevitably playing a large part in forming the democratic public culture, much as the universality and eclecticism of television does today. The lyceum--the numerous ones in all parts of the country--is studied not only as representing the diversity and interests of 19th-century America, but also as a central, fundamental ground of rhetoric as "that art by which culture and community and character are constituted and transformed." Though "lyceum" is now an antique word and only traces of the idealism of its originators remain, one recognizes by Ray's historical and social study that the lyceum contributed greatly to the foundation of a unique American culture. This author is a professor in the Department of Communication Studies at Northwestern University.
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