Novels of manners exhibit social economies that bear some metaphorical resemblance to literal economies. In England and America, before the women's movement and the introduction of large numbers of women into the workforce, this was the woman's economy: the economy of manners. This thesis examines three novels of manners and argues that there is a sustaining economic metaphor to characterize each author's attitude toward the manners economy they portray. In Jane Austen's Mansfield Park, social economies are controlled by an invisible hand that can be trusted to reward deserving economic agents, and punish the undeserving. William Thackeray's Vanity Fair shows how social economies can be impacted by speculative bubbles, when some commodities are temporarily given more value than they really hold. Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth portrays a society which has gone off the gold standard of virtue, that values its social currencies without that organizing principle of virtue to give them stability. Each novel has some relationship with the codes of etiquette of its day, and contains many of the same currencies, though valued at dramatically different rates in each context. Female protagonists must take stock of the prevailing economic conditions, but their success or failure will have as much to do with the function or dysfunction of those conditions as with their own social choices. / Master of Arts / Novels of manners exhibit social economies that bear some metaphorical resemblance to literal economies. In England and America, before the women’s movement and the introduction of large numbers of women into the workforce, this was the woman’s economy: the economy of manners. This thesis examines three novels of manners and argues that there is a sustaining economic metaphor to characterize each author’s attitude toward the manners economy they portray. In Jane Austen’s <i>Mansfield Park</i>, social economies are controlled by an invisible hand that can be trusted to reward deserving economic agents, and punish the undeserving. William Thackeray’s <i>Vanity Fair</i> shows how social economies can be impacted by speculative bubbles, when some commodities are temporarily given more value than they really hold. Edith Wharton’s <i>The House of Mirth</i> portrays a society which has gone off the gold standard of virtue, that values its social currencies without that organizing principle of virtue to give them stability. Each novel has some relationship with the codes of etiquette of its day, and contains many of the same currencies, though valued at dramatically different rates in each context. Female protagonists must take stock of the prevailing economic conditions, but their success or failure will have as much to do with the function or dysfunction of those conditions as with their own social choices.

This study examines the archaeological reflections of group identity and socio-economic networks in the region of Essex and London in the Anglo-Saxon period, between c.400 and 1066. Given its location in the south-east of England, Essex was a key zone of socio-political interaction during the early medieval period. This doctoral research has brought together the stray and excavated archaeological material from the region for the first time. The thesis presented here is centred on diachronic, quantified distributional analyses of three key material culture classes: dress accessories, pottery, and coinage. The discussion synthesises the results of these analyses, examining the observed patterns within their broader archaeological context. The thesis reveals the emergence of a hybrid dress style in the 5th and 6th centuries. This appears to have been actively created in Essex to reflect a diverse cultural inheritance, but not a specific ethnic identity. However, from the mid-7th century these styles were rejected in favour of dynamic fashions, reflecting the maritime focus of the region, and especially links with the Merovingian/Carolingian Continent. From the later 9th century, Scandinavian dress and cultural practice are also apparent, particularly in north Essex This Continental orientation reflects the emergence and transformation of the North Sea network. The engagement of Essex communities with this network is studied in detail in this thesis. The coinage and pottery analyses reveal the emergence of several exchange hubs along the North Sea coast, as well as a generalized engagement with long-distance exchange among coastal communities. This system was disrupted, but not destroyed, by the Vikings, who linked Essex with wider Scandinavian networks. However, the long-term pattern shows the decline of coastal sites in favour of urban centres from the later 9th century.

This thesis provides the first sustained study of the material culture of dining among the gentry and ‘middling sort’ in early modern England. It focuses on the religious and ritual significance of the shared dining experience, interrogating the role objects played in engendering domestic commensality. The project establishes that through their material properties and ritualized uses, objects such as salt-cellars, eating utensils and banqueting trenchers, were essential instruments in the construction and communication of personal and social identities. I argue that developments in the material paraphernalia of dining functioned to create a sense of continuity and community during this period of profound religious and social change. Chapter One applies the anthropological theory of ‘distributed personhood’ to salt-cellars, offering new insights into why salts were considered particularly effective objects for conveying identity. Chapter Two draws connections between eating utensils and significant moments in the life cycle and argues that utensils could have strong ‘personal’ associations, which commemorated essential rites of passage and functioned as perpetual reminders of familial ties. Chapter Three investigates banqueting trenchers as tools for sociability and collective spiritual contemplation and examines how their visual and material qualities required a specific ‘performance’ from diners. As a whole, the thesis provides a framework for interpreting a neglected body of historical artefacts and it contributes new knowledge about how specific types of crafted objects communicated identity within the context of ritualized social activities.

This thesis is about popular rejoicing and public ritual in Norwich and Coventry from the Restoration of Charles II in 1660 to the Reform of the Municipal Corporations in 1835. It is distinctive in at least two ways; first in its attention to the local context, and second in its examination of public festivity as a separate, but not an isolated, cultural form. Previous studies of the subject have generally looked at rejoicing and ritual as but one strand of a larger, fairly amorphous, popular culture and done so on a national or even a continental level. The study is divided into three parts. The first is largely descriptive; an account of the festive events, whether on the annual holiday calendar or not, which took place in Norwich and Coventry at or about 1750. This not only sets the scene for the analysis which follows, it also indicates the extent to which rejoicing and ritual was subject to social, political and economic change. That this was so will become clear in the second part of this study which identifies the three major developments to affect the conduct of and attitudes to public festivity at Norwich and Coventry in this period; commercialisation, political change and the divergence of polite and plebeian cultures. The extent to which the impact of these developments varied between the two cities is also explored in this section, as it is in part three of the thesis which is made of two case studies, one of the Norwich Guild and the other of the Coventry Show Fair. The very different form and fortune of these two events will be seen to confirm the importance of studying rejoicing and ritual in relation to the most immediate context in which it was performed.

Based on the author's long term fieldwork from 2005 to 2008 in Qiaoxiang, a rural Hakka community in Xingning County, Guangdong Province, Southeastern China, this dissertation examines how the revival of tradition in contemporary China can be understood through the dynamic interaction and negotiation among state, villagers and local elites. This ethnography describes the history and reality of tumultuous social change in the community, especially in Maoist and post-Maoist times, and shows how the villagers living in weilongwu, a characteristic lineage or multi-family compound of the Hakka heartland, have managed to mobilize political, social and cultural resources to deal with outside forces in contemporary China. I analyze how the Maoist state's attempts to break down kinship ties failed and how kinship's importance has been maintained and strengthened in both collective and post-collective periods. This dissertation focuses on how the participation and collaboration of ordinary villagers and village elites facilitates a vigorous revival of tradition, including the establishment of organizations at the level of lineage and community, the reediting of genealogies, the rebuilding and renovation of ancestral halls, and most importantly, the reactivation of kinship rituals. I demonstrate how the active engagement and complicated entanglement of socialist state, overseas power and other contemporary forces has shaped and reshaped the social and cultural landscape of the local community. I argue that the revival of tradition is by no means a remnant of the past or a total invention; instead, traditions are forming within the fluctuating context of Late Imperial legacy, state imposition and uncertain modernity. I also argue that the ordinary villagers are not passive subjects of domination by state power or other forces; instead, they are sophisticated activists possessing the strategic competence and wisdom to deal with the circumstances in which they live. In this sense, tradition should be taken as the practice of ordinary people in an ongoing process of inventing and becoming.