Books by Joy Giguere
From the University of Tennessee Press Spring 2014 Catalog Entry:
Prior to the nineteenth centur... more From the University of Tennessee Press Spring 2014 Catalog Entry:
Prior to the nineteenth century, few Americans knew anything more of Egyptian culture than what could be gained from studying the biblical Exodus. Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt at the end of the eighteenth century, however, initiated a cultural breakthrough for Americans as representations of Egyptian culture flooded western museums and publications, sparking a growing interest in all things Egyptian that was coined Egyptomania. As Egyptomania swept over the West, a relatively young America began assimilating Egyptian culture into its own national identity, creating a hybrid national heritage that would vastly affect the memorial landscape of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Far more than a study of Egyptian revivalism, this book examines the Egyptian style of commemoration from the rural cemetery to national obelisks to the Sphinx at Mount Auburn Cemetery. Giguere argues that Americans adopted Egyptian forms of commemoration as readily as other neoclassical styles such as Greek revivalism, noting that the American landscape is littered with monuments that define the Egyptian style’s importance to American national identity. Of particular interest is perhaps America’s greatest commemorative obelisk: the Washington Monument. Standing at 555 feet high and constructed entirely of stone—making it the tallest obelisk in the world—the Washington Monument represents the pinnacle of Egyptian architecture’s influence on America’s desire to memorialize its national heroes by employing monumental forms associated with solidity and timelessness. Construction on the monument began in 1848, but controversy over its design, which at one point included a Greek colonnade surrounding the obelisk, and the American Civil War halted construction until 1877. Interestingly, Americans saw the completion of the Washington Monument after the Civil War as a mending of the nation itself, melding Egyptian commemoration with the reconstruction of America.
As the twentieth century saw the rise of additional commemorative obelisks, the Egyptian Revival became ensconced in American national identity. Egyptian-style architecture has been used as a form of commemoration in memorials for World War I and II, the civil rights movement, and even as recently as the 9/11 remembrances. Giguere places the Egyptian style in a historical context that demonstrates how Americans actively sought to forge a national identity reminiscent of Egyptian culture that has endured to the present day.
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Articles by Joy Giguere
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Teaching Documents by Joy Giguere
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Interviews/Podcasts by Joy Giguere
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Papers by Joy Giguere
Journal of the Early Republic, 2018
Abstract:When the Rural Cemetery Movement began with the establishment of Mount Auburn Cemetery i... more Abstract:When the Rural Cemetery Movement began with the establishment of Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1831, the new institutions served the needs of the living as much as for the dead. While providing ample space for burials, the beautifully landscaped environments offered to visitors the opportunity to enjoy "nature" in a park-like setting. Established in the years prior to the development of large public parks, rural cemeteries were experimental public spaces in which people had to navigate what might be considered proper versus improper behaviors. Newspapers and journals would prove instrumental in exposing visitors' disregard for propriety and the efforts by cemetery proprietors to curb misbehavior would lay the groundwork for the establishment of rigidly enforced regulations during the public parks movement in the second half of the nineteenth century.
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Presented at Race and/or Reconciliation, the Third Conference on Veterans in Society, which took ... more Presented at Race and/or Reconciliation, the Third Conference on Veterans in Society, which took place in Roanoke, VA from November 12-14, 2015.
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Ohio Valley History, 2019
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Journal of Southern History, 2018
While visiting Boston in the spring of 1847, Richmond, Virginia, businessmen Joshua J. Fry and Wi... more While visiting Boston in the spring of 1847, Richmond, Virginia, businessmen Joshua J. Fry and William H. Haxall toured Mount Auburn Cemetery in nearbyCambridge. Established in 1831 as the nation’s first rural cemetery—so named because of its adherence to a natural, rural aesthetic despite its suburban location—Mount Auburn was famous throughout the United States and Western Europe for its beautiful landscape, splendid monuments, and “solemn grandeur.” Inspired by their experience, Fry and Haxall resolved to establish a similar cemetery for their own city. After making appeals to silversmithWilliamMitchell Jr. and Isaac Davenport, a senior partner in the firm of Davenport and Allen, the four men purchased Harvie’s Woods, a plot of land that “bordered several sites already popular with those escaping the bustle of the city, including Clarke’s Springs, the grounds ofMajor John Clarke’s estate, and Belvidere, the former home of William Byrd III.” In August, the men organized a board of directors, whosemembers included ThomasH. Ellis, president of the James River and Kanawha Canal Company, and New England transplants James Henry Gardner, a shoe merchant, and Horace L. Kent, a wholesale dry goods merchant. In February 1848 Philadelphia architect John Notman furnished the design for the proposed cemetery as well as its name—Hollywood Cemetery, due to the abundance of holly trees on the grounds. At the cemetery’s formal dedication on June 25, 1849, Oliver P. Baldwin compared the newly established burial place with its counterparts in the Northeast, declaring “that a more beautiful place could not have been selected for a tabernacle for the dead.”
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Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, 2017
In the hamlet of Fairview, Kentucky, stands one of the nation’s most imposing, yet obscure, monum... more In the hamlet of Fairview, Kentucky, stands one of the nation’s most imposing, yet obscure, monuments—a 351-foot tall, unreinforced concrete obelisk dedicated to the memory of Confederate president Jefferson Davis. Located in the middle of the Jefferson Davis State Historic Site, the monument’s conception dates back to the September 1907 reunion of the famed Orphan Brigade, which had been the largest Confederate unit from Kentucky during the Civil War. At the meeting, Dr. C. C. Brown suggested creating an association that would purchase and preserve the Davis family homestead in Fairview. The nation was, at that time, engaged in apotheosizing Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln’s birthplace, near Hodgenville, Kentucky, became a national park in 1916, and the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., was completed in 1922. Creating a park with a central memorial monument for Jefferson Davis would be Confederate Kentuckians’ response to this phenomenon, and within a short period, several members of the Orphan Brigade formed the Jefferson Davis Home Association (JDHA) for the purpose of acquiring Davis’s birthplace and turning it into a national park, similar to the Lincoln homestead.1
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Books by Joy Giguere
Prior to the nineteenth century, few Americans knew anything more of Egyptian culture than what could be gained from studying the biblical Exodus. Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt at the end of the eighteenth century, however, initiated a cultural breakthrough for Americans as representations of Egyptian culture flooded western museums and publications, sparking a growing interest in all things Egyptian that was coined Egyptomania. As Egyptomania swept over the West, a relatively young America began assimilating Egyptian culture into its own national identity, creating a hybrid national heritage that would vastly affect the memorial landscape of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Far more than a study of Egyptian revivalism, this book examines the Egyptian style of commemoration from the rural cemetery to national obelisks to the Sphinx at Mount Auburn Cemetery. Giguere argues that Americans adopted Egyptian forms of commemoration as readily as other neoclassical styles such as Greek revivalism, noting that the American landscape is littered with monuments that define the Egyptian style’s importance to American national identity. Of particular interest is perhaps America’s greatest commemorative obelisk: the Washington Monument. Standing at 555 feet high and constructed entirely of stone—making it the tallest obelisk in the world—the Washington Monument represents the pinnacle of Egyptian architecture’s influence on America’s desire to memorialize its national heroes by employing monumental forms associated with solidity and timelessness. Construction on the monument began in 1848, but controversy over its design, which at one point included a Greek colonnade surrounding the obelisk, and the American Civil War halted construction until 1877. Interestingly, Americans saw the completion of the Washington Monument after the Civil War as a mending of the nation itself, melding Egyptian commemoration with the reconstruction of America.
As the twentieth century saw the rise of additional commemorative obelisks, the Egyptian Revival became ensconced in American national identity. Egyptian-style architecture has been used as a form of commemoration in memorials for World War I and II, the civil rights movement, and even as recently as the 9/11 remembrances. Giguere places the Egyptian style in a historical context that demonstrates how Americans actively sought to forge a national identity reminiscent of Egyptian culture that has endured to the present day.
Articles by Joy Giguere
Teaching Documents by Joy Giguere
Interviews/Podcasts by Joy Giguere
Papers by Joy Giguere
Prior to the nineteenth century, few Americans knew anything more of Egyptian culture than what could be gained from studying the biblical Exodus. Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt at the end of the eighteenth century, however, initiated a cultural breakthrough for Americans as representations of Egyptian culture flooded western museums and publications, sparking a growing interest in all things Egyptian that was coined Egyptomania. As Egyptomania swept over the West, a relatively young America began assimilating Egyptian culture into its own national identity, creating a hybrid national heritage that would vastly affect the memorial landscape of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Far more than a study of Egyptian revivalism, this book examines the Egyptian style of commemoration from the rural cemetery to national obelisks to the Sphinx at Mount Auburn Cemetery. Giguere argues that Americans adopted Egyptian forms of commemoration as readily as other neoclassical styles such as Greek revivalism, noting that the American landscape is littered with monuments that define the Egyptian style’s importance to American national identity. Of particular interest is perhaps America’s greatest commemorative obelisk: the Washington Monument. Standing at 555 feet high and constructed entirely of stone—making it the tallest obelisk in the world—the Washington Monument represents the pinnacle of Egyptian architecture’s influence on America’s desire to memorialize its national heroes by employing monumental forms associated with solidity and timelessness. Construction on the monument began in 1848, but controversy over its design, which at one point included a Greek colonnade surrounding the obelisk, and the American Civil War halted construction until 1877. Interestingly, Americans saw the completion of the Washington Monument after the Civil War as a mending of the nation itself, melding Egyptian commemoration with the reconstruction of America.
As the twentieth century saw the rise of additional commemorative obelisks, the Egyptian Revival became ensconced in American national identity. Egyptian-style architecture has been used as a form of commemoration in memorials for World War I and II, the civil rights movement, and even as recently as the 9/11 remembrances. Giguere places the Egyptian style in a historical context that demonstrates how Americans actively sought to forge a national identity reminiscent of Egyptian culture that has endured to the present day.