Richard Godbeer
Biographic Data
| ID | 1001526 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Richard Godbeer |
| GIVEN NAMES | Richard |
| FAMILY NAME | Godbeer |
| SIGNATURE | GODBEER R |
| AFFILIATIONS | Virginia Commonwealth University |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 4 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 20 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1991 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2018 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Vexed with Devils: Manhood and Witchcraft in Old and New England
This latest addition to the voluminous literature on early modern witchcraft and possession argues that cultural norms relating to manhood played a crucial role in witch prosecutions and demoniac cases on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. A growing number of scholars are examining the ways possession cases and witch trials in Europe and America can illuminate conceptions of masculinity; their work reaffirms and broadens the claims made by women's…
Charity and Sylvia: A Same-Sex Marriage in Early America, by Rachel Hope Cleves
Recovering the history of same-sex desire has proven to be extremely challenging, not least because people in the past who desired members of the same sex were understandably reluctant to acknowledge feelings and behaviour that attracted social stigma and criminal prosecution. The descendants of these individuals, as well as archivists and historians, have often played an active role in suppressing evidence about their lives. And prior to the inv…
Founding Friendships: Friendships between Men and Women in the Early Republic. By Cassandra A. Good
Scholarship on same-sex friendships and marital friendships in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries has shown that Americans saw friendship as playing a crucial role in the new republic, providing intimate companionship and fostering personal virtue that would in turn inspire virtuous behavior in the public sphere. Americans hoped that these horizontal bonds would replace vertical ties of deference and patronage, embodying a more eg…
The Overflowing of Friendship: Love Between Men and the Creation of the American Republic
Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
Courtship and Sexual Freedom in Eighteenth-Century America
It was not unusual for courting couples in late eighteenth-century New England to spend the night with each other—often in their parents' homes and with their parents' permission. Andrew Burnaby, a young Englishman who was traveling through the North American colonies in 1759–1760, reported as follows: “At their usual time the old couple retire to bed, leaving the young ones to settle matters as they can, who after having sat up as long as they t…
In the Devil's Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692
How could they believe that: Explaining to Students Why Accusations of Witchcraft Made Good Sense in Seventeenth-Century New England
“How could they believe that?” “Were they just stupid?” “Why would they buy into such crazy ideas?” Over a decade ago I began giving lectures about witchcraft in colonial New England, mostly to college students but occasionally also to high school students. One of the greatest challenges I faced was how to overcome the tendency of many in the audience to dismiss early American witch beliefs and accusations as the result of “superstition” or “igno…
The Devil's Mousetrap: Redemption and Colonial American Literature
Journal Article The Devils Mousetrap: Redemption and Colonial American Literature. By Linda Munk. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. xiv, 144 pp. $35.00, ISBN 0-19-511494-9.) Get access Richard Godbeer Richard Godbeer University of California, Riverside, California Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of American History, Volume 85, Issue 3, December 1998, Pages 1054–1055, https://doi.org/10.2307…
Seers of God: Puritan Providentialism in the Restoration and Early Enlightenment
The Death of Satan: How Americans Have Lost Their Sense of Evil
"Love Raptures": Marital, Romantic, and Erotic Images of Jesus Christ in Puritan New England, 1670-1730
ON 19 October 1717, Samuel Sewall's first wife, Hannah Hull, died at the age of fifty-nine. God, Sewall wrote in his diary, would now teach him new lesson; to live a widower's life. By February 1718, though, Sewall was already contemplating another loving union. The prospective spouse about whom he enthused in his diary was not, however, one of the Bostonian widows before whom he would later lay his suit
The Cry of Sodom: Discourse, Intercourse, and Desire in Colonial New England
N i rICHOLAS Sension settled in Windsor, Connecticut, around i640, married in i645, and became a prosperous member of his community during the ensuing years. Sension's marriage was childless, but his life appears to have been otherwise unexceptional save in one regard: in i677, he appeared before the colony's General Court, charged with sodomy.1 The frank and detailed testimony presented to the court by neighbors and acquaintances left no room fo…
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
Journal Article The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England. By Richard Godbeer. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992. x, 253 pp. $24.95, ISBN 0-521-40329-4.) Get access Gerald F. Moran Gerald F. Moran University of Michigan, Dearborn, Michigan Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of American History, Volume 81, Issue 2, September 1994, Page 646, https://doi.org/10.2307/2081204 …
The Shaker Experience in America: A History of the United Society of Believers
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
Religion and the Persistence of Magic: Puritanism, Magic, and Witchcraft in New England
Scholarly books about New England witchcraft almost automatically earn a wide readership-both academic and popular-but reaping the benefits of such an appealing opportunity requires their authors to navigate a dense secondary literature by all those who have gone before. Richard Godbeer's The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England takes the tack of focusing on magic-something that has been done only a few times previously and n…
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
The Devil's Dominion examines the use of folk magic by ordinary men and women in early New England. The book describes in vivid detail the magical techniques used by settlers and the assumptions which underlaid them. Godbeer argues that layfolk were generally far less consistent in their beliefs and actions than their ministers would have liked; even church members sometimes turned to magic. The Devil's Dominion reveals that the relationship betw…
Witch-Hunting in Seventeenth-Century New England: A Documentary History, 1638-1692
This superb documentary collection illuminates the history of witchcraft and witch-hunting in seventeenth-century New England. The cases examined begin in 1638, extend to the Salem outbreak in 1692, and document for the first time the extensive Stamford-Fairfield, Connecticut, witch-hunt of 1692-1693. Here one encounters witch-hunts through the eyes of those who participated in them: the accusers, the victims, the judges. The original texts tell …
The Cry of Sodom: Discourse, Intercourse, and Desire in Colonial New England
N i rICHOLAS Sension settled in Windsor, Connecticut, around i640, married in i645, and became a prosperous member of his community during the ensuing years. Sension's marriage was childless, but his life appears to have been otherwise unexceptional save in one regard: in i677, he appeared before the colony's General Court, charged with sodomy.1 The frank and detailed testimony presented to the court by neighbors and acquaintances left no room fo…
Witch-Hunting in Seventeenth-Century New England: A Documentary History, 1638-1692
This superb documentary collection illuminates the history of witchcraft and witch-hunting in seventeenth-century New England. The cases examined begin in 1638, extend to the Salem outbreak in 1692, and document for the first time the extensive Stamford-Fairfield, Connecticut, witch-hunt of 1692-1693. Here one encounters witch-hunts through the eyes of those who participated in them: the accusers, the victims, the judges. The original texts tell …
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
The Devil's Dominion examines the use of folk magic by ordinary men and women in early New England. The book describes in vivid detail the magical techniques used by settlers and the assumptions which underlaid them. Godbeer argues that layfolk were generally far less consistent in their beliefs and actions than their ministers would have liked; even church members sometimes turned to magic. The Devil's Dominion reveals that the relationship betw…
Religion and the Persistence of Magic: Puritanism, Magic, and Witchcraft in New England
Scholarly books about New England witchcraft almost automatically earn a wide readership-both academic and popular-but reaping the benefits of such an appealing opportunity requires their authors to navigate a dense secondary literature by all those who have gone before. Richard Godbeer's The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England takes the tack of focusing on magic-something that has been done only a few times previously and n…
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
Journal Article The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England. By Richard Godbeer. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992. x, 253 pp. $24.95, ISBN 0-521-40329-4.) Get access Gerald F. Moran Gerald F. Moran University of Michigan, Dearborn, Michigan Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of American History, Volume 81, Issue 2, September 1994, Page 646, https://doi.org/10.2307/2081204 …
The Shaker Experience in America: A History of the United Society of Believers
The Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
"Love Raptures": Marital, Romantic, and Erotic Images of Jesus Christ in Puritan New England, 1670-1730
ON 19 October 1717, Samuel Sewall's first wife, Hannah Hull, died at the age of fifty-nine. God, Sewall wrote in his diary, would now teach him new lesson; to live a widower's life. By February 1718, though, Sewall was already contemplating another loving union. The prospective spouse about whom he enthused in his diary was not, however, one of the Bostonian widows before whom he would later lay his suit
The Cry of Sodom: Discourse, Intercourse, and Desire in Colonial New England
N i rICHOLAS Sension settled in Windsor, Connecticut, around i640, married in i645, and became a prosperous member of his community during the ensuing years. Sension's marriage was childless, but his life appears to have been otherwise unexceptional save in one regard: in i677, he appeared before the colony's General Court, charged with sodomy.1 The frank and detailed testimony presented to the court by neighbors and acquaintances left no room fo…
The Death of Satan: How Americans Have Lost Their Sense of Evil
Seers of God: Puritan Providentialism in the Restoration and Early Enlightenment
The Devil's Mousetrap: Redemption and Colonial American Literature
Journal Article The Devils Mousetrap: Redemption and Colonial American Literature. By Linda Munk. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. xiv, 144 pp. $35.00, ISBN 0-19-511494-9.) Get access Richard Godbeer Richard Godbeer University of California, Riverside, California Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of American History, Volume 85, Issue 3, December 1998, Pages 1054–1055, https://doi.org/10.2307…
In the Devil's Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692
How could they believe that: Explaining to Students Why Accusations of Witchcraft Made Good Sense in Seventeenth-Century New England
“How could they believe that?” “Were they just stupid?” “Why would they buy into such crazy ideas?” Over a decade ago I began giving lectures about witchcraft in colonial New England, mostly to college students but occasionally also to high school students. One of the greatest challenges I faced was how to overcome the tendency of many in the audience to dismiss early American witch beliefs and accusations as the result of “superstition” or “igno…
Courtship and Sexual Freedom in Eighteenth-Century America
It was not unusual for courting couples in late eighteenth-century New England to spend the night with each other—often in their parents' homes and with their parents' permission. Andrew Burnaby, a young Englishman who was traveling through the North American colonies in 1759–1760, reported as follows: “At their usual time the old couple retire to bed, leaving the young ones to settle matters as they can, who after having sat up as long as they t…
Devil's Dominion: Magic and Religion in Early New England
The Overflowing of Friendship: Love Between Men and the Creation of the American Republic
Charity and Sylvia: A Same-Sex Marriage in Early America, by Rachel Hope Cleves
Recovering the history of same-sex desire has proven to be extremely challenging, not least because people in the past who desired members of the same sex were understandably reluctant to acknowledge feelings and behaviour that attracted social stigma and criminal prosecution. The descendants of these individuals, as well as archivists and historians, have often played an active role in suppressing evidence about their lives. And prior to the inv…
Founding Friendships: Friendships between Men and Women in the Early Republic. By Cassandra A. Good
Scholarship on same-sex friendships and marital friendships in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries has shown that Americans saw friendship as playing a crucial role in the new republic, providing intimate companionship and fostering personal virtue that would in turn inspire virtuous behavior in the public sphere. Americans hoped that these horizontal bonds would replace vertical ties of deference and patronage, embodying a more eg…
Vexed with Devils: Manhood and Witchcraft in Old and New England
This latest addition to the voluminous literature on early modern witchcraft and possession argues that cultural norms relating to manhood played a crucial role in witch prosecutions and demoniac cases on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. A growing number of scholars are examining the ways possession cases and witch trials in Europe and America can illuminate conceptions of masculinity; their work reaffirms and broadens the claims made by women's…
History (11 works) · Art (9 works) · History (9 works) · Mormonism, Religion, and History (8 works) · Political science (8 works) · American Constitutional Law and Politics (7 works) · Religious Studies and Spiritual Practices (7 works) · Sociology (7 works) · Philosophy (6 works) · Psychology (6 works)