Website Spotlight: Religion and the Founding of the American Republic

Website URL: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/overview.html

Introductory Note:

Welcome to one in a series of posts which spotlight quality websites that I use with my U.S. History survey course students at Azusa Pacific University to enrich the regular material in our learning modules.

In this post, I limit myself to those specific aspects of the website which I find fit particularly well within our face-to-face class sessions (each student is required to bring a laptop to class) or as the basis for the students' regularly-assigned written reactions.

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I ask the students to work through the following links--at the point in the semester when appropriate:

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America as a Religious Refuge: The 17th-Century

Part 1:
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel01.html

Read the entire screen:

European Persecution
Crossing the Ocean to Keep the Faith: the Puritans
The Bible Commonwealths

Part 2:
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel01-2.html

Read the entire screen:

Persecution in America
Jews Find a Refuge in America
The Quakers
The Pennsylvania Germans
Roman Catholics in Maryland
Virginia

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Religion in 18th-Century America
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel02.html

1. Read the Introduction.

2. You can skip the section entitled "The Appearance of Eighteenth-Century Churches."

3. Deal with "Deism" briefly.

4. Then spend most of your time on the remainder of the page:

"The Emergence of American Evangelicalism: The [First] Great Awakening"

George Whitefield
Jonathan Edwards
The Revival of Northampton
Sinners Warned
Transatlantic Evangelicalism
Criticism of other ministers
The Baptists
Francis Asbury
Beginning of the Methodists
Organization of the Methodists

See also:

Article by professor Christine Heyrman on The First Great Awakening
http://www.nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/eighteen/ekeyinfo/grawaken.htm

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Religion and the American Revolution
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel03.html

Read the entire screen:

Religion as Cause of the Revolution
Jonathan Mayhew
Resistance to Tyranny as a Christian Duty
Revolution Understood in Scriptural Terms
The Plot to Land a Bishop
Revolution Justified by God
A Minister in Arms
A Fighting Parson
A Revolutionary Chaplain
Revolutionary Battle Flag
John Witherspoon
A Quaker Schism
Free Quaker Meeting House
The Problems of the American Anglicans

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Religion and the New Republic
2nd Great Awakening
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel07.html

Read the entire screen:

I. Introductory paragraphs:

The Atheist's Bible
Paine Rebuked
The Tree of Life

II. The Camp Meeting:

Outdoor Communion
Camp Meeting Plan
Religious Revival in America

III. The Emergence of the African American Church:

Woman Preacher of the A.M.E. Church
Christian Charity
Absalom Jones
Religious Exuberance
Jerking Exercise
The Shakers

IV. The Mormons:

The Book of Mormon
The Murder of Joseph and Hiram Smith
Migration to Utah

V. Benevolent Societies:

Missions to Sailors
Missionaries' Reports
Circuit Preaching
A Thousand Years of Happiness

See also:

Evangelicalism in Antebellum America
http://investigatinghistory.ashp.cuny.edu/m4.html

Evangelicalism, Revivalism, and the Second Great Awakening
http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/nineteen/nkeyinfo/nevanrev.htm

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~~For a review of this overall website:

TeachingHistory.org (National History Education Clearinghouse)
http://teachinghistory.org/history-content/website-reviews/14649

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Concluding Note:

I hope you will use this blog post in conjunction with both the modules on my Learning Professor wiki and the numerous other posts in my Website Spotlight series.

1. The website spotlighted in this post fits within several U.S. History survey course modules on my wiki:
http://thelearningprofessor.wikispaces.com/Colonial+Era
http://thelearningprofessor.wikispaces.com/Road+to+Revolution
http://thelearningprofessor.wikispaces.com/Reform

2. The other blog posts in my Website Spotlight series--chronologically displayed by U.S. History survey course module-- can be found on this wiki page:
http://thelearningprofessor.wikispaces.com/WEBSITE+SPOTLIGHT