{"product_id":"ruin-nation-megan-kate-nelson-9780820333977","title":"Ruin Nation: Destruction and the American Civil War","description":"\u003cp\u003eDuring the Civil War, cities, houses, forests, and soldiers' bodies were transformed into \"dead heaps of ruins,\" novel sights in the southern landscape. How did this happen, and why? And what did Americans--northern and southern, black and white, male and female--make of this proliferation of ruins? \u003ci\u003eRuin Nation\u003c\/i\u003e is the first book to bring together environmental and cultural histories to consider the evocative power of ruination as an imagined state, an act of destruction, and a process of change. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eMegan Kate Nelson examines the narratives and images that Americans produced as they confronted the war's destructiveness. Architectural ruins--cities and houses--dominated the stories that soldiers and civilians told about the \"savage\" behavior of men and the invasions of domestic privacy. The ruins of living things--trees and bodies--also provoked discussion and debate. People who witnessed forests and men being blown apart were plagued by anxieties about the impact of wartime technologies on nature and on individual identities. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThe obliteration of cities, houses, trees, and men was a shared experience. Nelson shows that this is one of the ironies of the war's ruination--in a time of the most extreme national divisiveness people found common ground as they considered the war's costs. And yet, very few of these ruins still exist, suggesting that the destructive practices that dominated the experiences of Americans during the Civil War have been erased from our national consciousness.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Megan Kate Nelson\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0820333972\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780820333977\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University of Georgia Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 05\/15\/2012\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 400\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.45lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.94d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eReview Citation(s): \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eChoice\u003c\/i\u003e 12\/01\/2012","brand":"Megan Kate Nelson","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":44120342659327,"sku":"9780820333977","price":120.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_74021688-c357-4fc4-a7ae-ad847c223008.jpg?v=1687413808","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/ruin-nation-megan-kate-nelson-9780820333977","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}