This book of essays on British social and cultural history since the eighteenth century draws attention to relatively neglected topics including personal and collective identities, the meanings of place, especially locality, and the significance of cultures of association. Themes range from rural England in the eighteenth century to the urbanizing society of the nineteenth century; from the Home Front in the First World War to voluntary action in the welfare state; from post 1945 civic culture to the advice columns of teenage magazines and the national press. Various aspects of civil society connect these themes notably: the different identities of place, locality and association that emerged with the growth of an urban environment during the nineteenth century and the shifting landscape of twentieth-century public discourse on social welfare and personal morality. It is of interest that several of the essays take Manchester or Lancashire as their focus.

Reviews

'This collection is a fitting tribute to a greatly respected social historian who has done much to bring history outside the walls of the academy.'
Alan Fowler, North West Labour History Society

Introduction - Alan Kidd and Melanie Tebbutt
1. Administrative practices and the 'middling sort': place, practice and identity in eighteenth-century rural England - Alistair Mutch
2. Local history enthusiasts: English county historical societies since the nineteenth century - Alan Kidd
3. Memorial mania: remembering and forgetting Sir Robert Peel - Terry Wyke
4. Fifty years ahead of its time? The provident dispensaries movement in Manchester, 1871-85 - Martin Hewitt
5. Daddy, what did you find to laugh about in the Great War? The cotton cartoons of Sam Fitton - Alan Fowler
6. Voluntary action in the 'welfare state': the National Council for the Unmarried Mother and Her Child - Pat Thane
7. The continuing tradition of civic pride: municipal culture in post-war Manchester - Peter Shapely
8. From 'marriage bureau' to 'points of view': changing patterns of advice in teenage magazines: Mirabelle, 1956-77 - Melanie Tebbutt
9. 'Hoping you'll give me some guidance about this thing called money': the Daily Mirror and personal finance, c. 1960-81 - Dilwyn Porter
Index

Editors

Alan Kidd is Emeritus Professor of History at Manchester Metropolitan University

Melanie Tebbutt is Professor of History at Manchester Metropolitan University