© Columbia University Press
Moral Geography: Maps, Missionaries, and the American Frontier
Paper, 256 pages,
ISBN: 978-0-231-12789-9
$32.50
/ £22.50
March, 2003
Cloth, 256 pages,
ISBN: 978-0-231-12788-2
$90.00
/ £62.00
"Moral Geography provides a much better guidebook to the region and its religion, and DeRogatis never lets us get lost, taking us along a scholarly path that seems both familiar and fresh at the same time." — Gregory Nobles, Journal of American History
"Interesting and innovative . . . Most readers ofMoral Geography will appreciate DeRogatis's attempt to 'read' material sources in seeking to understand the landscape of the Western Reserve." — Lydia Huffman Hoyle, Regster of the Kentucky Historical Society
"...the brief narrative here does little justice to the nuanced deconstruction of maps, letters, biography, and travel literature that comprises the heart of DeRogatis's work. From close readings of these texts she has skillfully teased out a language in her sources..." — William H. Bergmann, Ohio HistoryUniversity of Cincinnati
"Moral Geography does a great service by introducing those who felt the tension between new and old orders." — Kathleen Flake, Journal of Religion
"Amy DeRogatis' sketch of moral geography on the American frontier has opened up a rich and fertile vein of scholarship." — David N. Livingstone, Books & Culture
"Innovative new study of the religious settlement of Connecticut's "Western Reserve."... A model of interdisciplinary scholarship, and her new study will enjoy wide readership." — Douglas L. Winiarski, Religious Studies Review
"An insightful study of the historical landscape religiously mapped by missionaries operating under the Plan of Union in the early nineteenth century. The spatial perspective she employs, making use of missionary reports and travel literature alike, helps to illuminate tensions between the ideals of the missionary societies and the realities of frontier life. The result is a provocative and interdisciplinary work that will engage church historians, historical geographers, and others interested in the movement of the American frontier. I recommend it with enthusiasm." — Belden C. Lane, Hotfelder Distinguished Professor of Humanities, Saint Louis University
"There is much to recommend in this innovative and important study. DeRogatis overturns our understanding of the spatial organization, from personal to regional scales, of the post-Revolutionary American frontier. She makes a significant contribution to the on-going critical reevaluation of maps and map making, tearing down still further the false divide between graphic and literary maps. And, she reveals a new dimension to the complex historical construct that is 'New England.' Moral Geography is profitable reading for geographers, historians, and literary scholars, as well as students of religion and American studies." — Matthew Edney, professor of geography, University of Southern Maine
"Moral Geography is sure to provoke reassessment of the relationship between religion and space across all regions of the United States. . . . [It] brings to life the emergence of regional religion in the contest between the physical and moral 'maps' of missionaries and the real land and people of the early nineteenth-century frontier. This book raises important questions about relationships among power, meaning, religion, identity, national expansion, and colonialism. Clearly, Amy DeRogatis has demonstrated the fruitfulness of approaching space as a 'readable text.'" — Patricia O’Connell Killen, professor of American religious history, Pacific Lutheran University