The Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, Washington's Birthday, Memorial
Day, Columbus Day, Labor Day, Martin Luther King's Birthday, and
other celebrations matter to Americans and reflect the state of
American local and national politics. Commemorations of cataclysmic
events and light, apparently trivial observances mirror American
political and cultural life. Both reveal much about the material
conditions of the United States and its citizens' identities,
historical consciousness, and political attitudes. Lying dormant
within these festivals is the potential for political consequence,
controversy, even transformation. American political fetes remain
works in progress, as Americans use historical celebrations as
occasions to reinvent themselves and their nation, often with
surprising results. In six engaging chapters -- assaying particular
political holidays over the course of their histories, Red, White,
and Blue Letter Days examines how Americans have shaped and been
shaped by their calendar.
Matthew Dennis explores this vast political and cultural
terrain, charting how Americans defined their identities through
celebration. Independence Day invited African Americans to demand
the equality promised in the Declaration of Independence, for
example, just as Columbus Day -- celebrating the Italian, Catholic
explorer -- helped immigrants proclaim their legitimacy as
Americans. Native Americans too could use public holidays, such as
Thanksgiving or Veterans Day, to express dissent or demonstrate
their claims to citizenship. Merchants and advertisers colonized
the American calendar, moving in to sell their products by linking
them, often tenuously, with holiday occasions or casting
consumptionas a patriotic act.
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