Siblings

C. Dallett Hemphill is a Professor of History at Ursinus College. She is the author of Bowing to Necessities: A History of Manners in America, 1620-1860. She has seven siblings.

• Introduction ; Part I: Siblings in a New World ; Ch 1: Comparing Colonial Childhoods ; Ch 2: Survivors: Sibling Relations among Adults ; Ch 3: Siblings for Keeps in Early America ; Part II: Sublings in a Time of Revolution ; Ch 4: Finding Fraternity: Gender and the Revolution in Sentiment ; Ch 5: Republican Brothers and Sisters at Play ; Ch 6: Shock Absorbers: Young Adult Siblings in the New Century ; Part III: Sublings and Democracy in America ; Ch 7: Northern Homes as Found ; Ch 8: The Reign of the Elder Sister ; Ch 9: The Feminization of Kin-Keeping ; Ch 10: Telling Exceptions: Planters, Slaves, and Pioneers ; Epilogue: To the Back Seat Wars ; Notes ; Bibliography

Hemphill's striking insights into lateral relationships among children provides a provocative template for thinking about how childhood bonds sustained individuals who faced the constant upheavals of slavery, of removal, and of cultural erasure. This book will be of great value for scholars interested in early American history, the history of the family, and childhood studies.