The thirteen mainland colonies of early America were arguably never more British than on the eve of their War of Independence from Britain. Though home to settlers of diverse national and cultural backgrounds, colonial America gradually became more like Britain in its political and judicial systems, material culture, economies, religious systems, and engagements with the empire. At the same time and by the same process, these politically distinct and geographically distant colonies forged a shared cultural identity-one that would bind them together as a nation during the Revolution. Anglicizing America revisits the theory of Anglicization, considering its application to the history of the Atlantic world, from Britain to the Caribbean to the western wildernesses, at key moments before, during, and after the American Revolution. Ten essays by senior historians trace the complex processes by which global forces, local economies, and individual motives interacted to reinforce a more centralized and unified social movement. They examine the ways English ideas about labor influenced plantation slavery, how Great Britain's imperial aspirations shaped American militarization, the influence of religious tolerance on political unity, and how Americans' relationship to Great Britain after the war impacted the early republic's naval and taxation policies. As a whole, Anglicizing America offers a compelling framework for explaining the complex processes at work in the western hemisphere during the age of revolutions. Contributors: Denver Brunsman, William Howard Carter, Ignacio Gallup-Diaz, Anthony M. Joseph, Simon P. Newman, Geoffrey Plank, Nancy L. Rhoden, Andrew Shankman, David J. Silverman, Jeremy A. Stern.

Table of Contents:
Introduction -Ignacio Gallup-Diaz, Andrew Shankman, and David J. Silverman PART I. ANGLICIZATION Chapter 1. England and Colonial America: A Novel Theory of the American Revolution -John M. Murrin Chapter 2. A Synthesis Useful and Compelling: Anglicization and the Achievement of John M. Murrin -Andrew Shankman PART II. EMPIRE Chapter 3. "In Great Slavery and Bondage": White Labor and the Development of Plantation Slavery in British America -Simon P. Newman Chapter 4. Anglicizing the League: The Writing of Cadwallader Colden's History of the Five Indian Nations -William Howard Carter Chapter 5. A Medieval Response to a Wilderness Need: Anglicizing Warfare in Colonial America -Geoffrey Plank PART III. REVOLUTION Chapter 6. Anglicanism, Dissent, and Toleration in Eighteenth-Century British Colonies -Nancy L. Rhoden Chapter 7. Anglicization Against the Empire: Revolutionary Ideas and Identity in Townshend Crisis Massachusetts -Jeremy A. Stern PART IV. REPUBLIC Chapter 8. Racial Walls: Race and the Emergence of American White Nationalism -David J. Silverman Chapter 9. De-Anglicization: The Jeffersonian Attack on an American Naval Establishment -Denver Brunsman Chapter 10. Anglicization and the American Taxpayer, c. 1763-1815 -Anthony M. Joseph Conclusion. Anglicization Reconsidered -Ignacio Gallup-Diaz Notes List of Contributors Index Acknowledgments