Rudeness and Civility: Manners in Nineteenth-Century Urban America

With keen insight and subtle humor, John F. Kasson explores the history and politics of etiquette from America's colonial times through the nineteenth century. He describes the transformation of our notion of "gentility," once considered a birthright to some, and the development of etiquette as a middle-class response to the new urban and industrial economy and to the excesses of democratic society.Kasson, John F. is the author of 'Rudeness and Civility: Manners in Nineteenth-Century Urban America' with ISBN 9780809034703 and ISBN 0809034700.