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International Video Seminar: paper presentation via video conference with the University of Edinburgh A Revolting Fibre? Silk and the challenges of the American Revolution A Paper by Ben Marsh University of Stirling This book extract argues that silk was widely repudiated for its connotations of Old World opulence and frivolity during the Revolutionary Era. Silk's moral value fell as it was identified with monarchical extravagancy - an antithesis to republican homespun. But while silk's reputation plummeted along with imports, the story was nonetheless complicated by two enduring challenges. Firstly, the theory of exclusion was always more earnest than the practice of exclusion. Secondly, a range of protagonists sought to rehabilitate silk by linking the fibre to independence: attempts at silk cultivation repositioned the commodity as an article to be embraced rather than ostracised. Along the way, I hope to show (a) how American silk dreams were increasingly interconnected in the final third of the eighteenth century, (b) what was distinctive about Pennsylvanian attempts, and (c) how important female labour continued to be to American silk production. Copies of the paper are available for reading at the Institute, Swem Library's Reference and Circulation Desks, the Lyon G. Tyler Department of History, and the American Studies Program, all at the College of William and Mary; Colonial Williamsburg's John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Library; the University of Richmond's Department of History, the Virginia Commonwealth University's Department of History, the Library of Virginia, and the Virginia Historical Society, all in Richmond; Virginia State University's Department of History in Petersburg; Old Dominion University's Department of History in Norfolk; and the University of Virginia's Corcoran Department of History in Charlottesville. If you would like to receive the paper by email, please send Melody Smith (mlsmit@wm.edu<mailto:mlsmit@wm.edu>) your email address. DATE: Wednesday, November 20 TIME: 12:00 P.M. PLACE: Kellock Library Conference Room at the Institute, Swem Library, Ground Floor You are invited to bring your lunch. Drinks and dessert will be provided. Please submit requests for parking passes to Beverly Smith (basmit@wm.edu<mailto:basmit@wm.edu>) by 10:30 AM on November 20. The Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture is sponsored jointly by The College of William and Mary and The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. --
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