The National Church in Local Perspective

The political, social and economic role of the Church in the various regions of England, identifying common themes and highlighting regional differences.

This collection makes a significant contribution to the history of the Church of England in the period. Local and regional evidence from across the country illustrates the range of responses to a variety of problems and common themes. These include the church's relationship with protestant dissent and Roman Catholicism, its relationship with the laity, its social and economic position (which could alter during periods of economic change), and its responseto and participation in a number of significant political and social events such as the Restoration, the Revolution of 1688, the emergence of Jacobitism, and reactions to the French Revolution. Although local variations could indeed be extreme, this does not mean that there was no common experience: much of the interest of this collection comes from the exploration of different regional responses to shared difficulties. It also sheds new light on the issueof national identity, and particularly the concepts of Englishness and Britishness as they existed during the period.Contributors VIVIANE BARRIE, JEFFREY S. CHAMBERLAIN, FRANCOISE DECONINCK-BROSSARD, WILLIAM GIBSON, JEREMY GREGORY, COLIN HAYDON, W.M. JACOB, PHILIP JENKINS, W.M. MARSHALL, M.F. SNAPE, DONALD SPAETH.