A Is for American

Letters and Other Characters in the Newly United States

Nonfiction, Reference & Language, Language Arts, Linguistics, Biography & Memoir, Historical, History, Americas, United States
Cover of the book A Is for American by Jill Lepore, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
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Author: Jill Lepore ISBN: 9780307424389
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group Publication: December 18, 2007
Imprint: Vintage Language: English
Author: Jill Lepore
ISBN: 9780307424389
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication: December 18, 2007
Imprint: Vintage
Language: English

What ties Americans to one another? What unifies a nation of citizens with different racial, religious and ethnic backgrounds? These were the dilemmas faced by Americans in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as they sought ways to bind the newly United States together.

In A is for American, award-winning historian Jill Lepore portrays seven men who turned to language to help shape a new nation’s character and boundaries. From Noah Webster’s attempts to standardize American spelling, to Alexander Graham Bell’s use of “Visible Speech” to help teach the deaf to talk, to Sequoyah’s development of a Cherokee syllabary as a means of preserving his people’s independence, these stories form a compelling portrait of a developing nation’s struggles. Lepore brilliantly explores the personalities, work, and influence of these figures, seven men driven by radically different aims and temperaments. Through these superbly told stories, she chronicles the challenges faced by a young country trying to unify its diverse people.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

What ties Americans to one another? What unifies a nation of citizens with different racial, religious and ethnic backgrounds? These were the dilemmas faced by Americans in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as they sought ways to bind the newly United States together.

In A is for American, award-winning historian Jill Lepore portrays seven men who turned to language to help shape a new nation’s character and boundaries. From Noah Webster’s attempts to standardize American spelling, to Alexander Graham Bell’s use of “Visible Speech” to help teach the deaf to talk, to Sequoyah’s development of a Cherokee syllabary as a means of preserving his people’s independence, these stories form a compelling portrait of a developing nation’s struggles. Lepore brilliantly explores the personalities, work, and influence of these figures, seven men driven by radically different aims and temperaments. Through these superbly told stories, she chronicles the challenges faced by a young country trying to unify its diverse people.

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