Author:
Format: Quality Paperback
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: May 1979
Genre: History - United States
Retail Price: $16.95
Pages: 132
The two lectures presented in this important volume were delivered by Erik H. Erikson at the second annual Jefferson Lectures in the Humanities, sponsored by The National Endowment for the Humanitites.
In the first lecture, entitled "The Founders: Jeffersonion Action and Faith," Erikson uses selected themes from Jefferson's life to illustrate some principles of psychohistory. In the second lecture, "The Inheritors: Modern Insight and Foresight," Erikson applied his main concepts to the problems of ongoing history. The title of the lectures contains one such concept. "New identity" is the result of radical historical change and is here meant to characterize the emerging American identity as first embodied in such men as Jefferson.