This fascinating book is the first volume in a projected cultural history of the United States, from the earliest English settlements to our own time. It is a history of American folkways as they have changed through time, and it argues a thesis about the importance for the United States of having been British in its cultural origins.While most people in the United States today have no British ancestors, they have assimilated regional cultures which were created by British colonists, even while preserving ethnic identities at the same time. In this sense, nearly all Americans are "Albion's Seed," no matter what their ethnicity may be. The concluding section of this remarkable book explores the ways that regional cultures have continued to dominate national politics from 1789 to 1988, and still help to shape attitudes toward education, government, gender, and violence, on which differences between American regions are greater than between European nations. [from the publisher]
"More a reference book than a book you read straight through, this book advances the fascinating thesis that four groups of immigrants from England ( Albion ) essentially set much of what we now regard as American culture. The links between these four waves of immigrants from particular parts of England, and the Yankee, patrician Virginia, Quaker/Philadelphia, and Appalachian hill cultures, are documented.Its fascinating to see traits that seem inexplicable and odd traced back to obscure corners of 17th and 18th century England. We're talking about the way houses look, the way people get married, their attitude toward government, you name it." [from GoodReads]
