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The health and sanitation of postbellum Harpers Ferry

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Abstract

This paper examines the documentary and archaeological evidence for health reform in 19th-century postbellum Harpers Ferry. The analysis reviews the cultural logic embodied in the national health reform ideals, a late 19th-century social movement aimed at abolishing unhealthy living conditions. The model that guides this analysis is based on the premise that cultural categories and principles cannot be viewed as normative sociocultural systems regulating human action. As a result, social action and therefore cultural interpretation must be seen as an active and contested discourse. The diverse interpretations of the national ideals of health reform as suggested by the documentary and material evidence for Harpers Ferry are explained as conscious decisions framed in particular social, economic, and political contexts.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA, 22903

    Benjamin Ford

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  1. Benjamin Ford
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Ford, B. The health and sanitation of postbellum Harpers Ferry. Hist Arch 28, 49–61 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03374200

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