Discover the facts and foibles of the paradoxical Britons under the reign of Queen Victoria, as Britain became the world's pioneer in industrialization that transformed social classes and created both immense wealth and squalor. This colonial empire, based on technical superiority and widespread belief in Anglo-Saxon racial supremacy, made Britain the most powerful nation in the world and left behind an indelible legacy.
Victorian Britain
Examine the strengths and foibles of Victorian Britain with an award-winning professor.
Rated 5 out of
5
by
GUNTHER from
Prof. Allitt's Best Great Course Yet
Prof. Allitt has done a splendid job in presenting Britain at its apex, when at the end of the 20th century it was said the sun never set on the British Empire. Although there were Anglophiles worldwide outside the British Isles, in reality, the appreciation for things British masked its obsolete technology, no longer competitive with that of America and Germany. It took the Boer War and World War I to make England’s shortcoming painfully obvious to even the most jingoistic Brit. This is a very challenging subject because there is an embarrassment of riches in terms of the quantity of source material. In the literary canon many of us are familiar with fine Victorian writers, such as Dickens, Bronte, Conan Doyle and Hardy, but not many with Mr. Anonymous, author of My Secret Life, who chronicled in eleven volumes, to an eager readership, his sexual escapades, not only in England, but throughout the continent. In general regarding his lower class catches, he finds, They’ve lost all modesty. A new lover is a treat and fresh experience for them. Prof. Allitt unearths a similarly amusing gem in Fabian Socialist George Bernard Shaw’s speech: If in spite of all you cannot resist the temptation to be virtuous, go drown yourself, before you have the time to waste the lives of all around you. The central character of this lecture series, of course, is Queen Victoria herself, and her motivations are presented vividly. When she came to the throne as a teenager, she was acutely aware that any one of the children of Henry IV, her biological half-siblings, would have had precedence before her—if they weren’t all illegitimate! In a way, her lifetime concern with maintaining virtue and propriety was therefore an understandable reaction to the circumstgances of her accession to the throne. We also see her passionate nature, which reveals itself in the extensive index of her letters, including the one detailing when she sets eyes on her cousin Albert for the first time—and will subsequently decide to propose marriage to him. I have also taken Prof. Allitt’s Industrial Revolution course, which was excellent, but Victorian Britain was truly entertaining.
Date published: 2023-10-05
Rated 5 out of
5
by
GuntherG from
PROF. ALLITT'S BEST BREAT COURSE YET
Prof. Allitt has done a splendid job in presenting Britain at its apex, when at the end of the 20th century it was said the sun never set on the British Empire. Although Anglophiles worldwide smercantile grip, in reality, masked its obsolete technology, no longer competitive with that of America and Germany. It took the Boer War and World War I to make this shortcoming painfully obvious to even the most jingoistic Brit. This is a very challenging subject because there is an embarrassment of riches in terms of source material. In the literary canon many of us are familiar with fine Victorian writers, such as Dickens, Bronte, Conan Doyle and Hardy, but not many with Mr. Anonymous, author of My Secret Life, who chronicled in eleven volumes, to an eager readership, his sexual escapades, not only in England, but throughout the continent. In genera,l regarding his lower class catches, he finds, They’ve lost all modesty. A new lover is a treat and fresh experience for them. Prof. Allitt unearths a similarly amusing gem in Fabian Socialist George Bernard Shaw’s speech: If in spite of all you cannot resist the temptation to be virtuous, go drown yourself, before you have the time to waste the lives of all around you. The central character of this lecture series, of course, is Queen Victoria herself, and her motivations are presented vividly. When she came to the throne as a teenager, she was acutely aware that any one of the children of Henry IV, her biological half-siblings, would have had precedence before her—if they weren’t all illegitimate! In a way, her lifetime concern with maintaining virtue and propriety was therefore an understandable reaction to her accession to the throne. We also see her passionate nature, which reveals itself in the extensive index of her letters, including the one deatailing when she sets eyes on her cousin Albert for the first time—and will subsequently decide to propose marriage to him. I have also taken Prof. Allitt’s Industrial Revolution course, which was excellent, but Victorian Britain was truly entertaining.
Date published: 2023-10-05
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Walter B from
Outstanding lecturer
This lecturer is very thorough, and manages to throw in a lot of interesting and useful information, while still maintaining a good sense of balance and humor.
Date published: 2023-04-18
Rated 5 out of
5
by
kacx from
Excellent Overview of Victorian Britain
Just like Victoria's reign, this is a long course. It is very detailed and covers every subject you might think of. I have not found a way to tell when these courses were made. But, this appears to be a bit older and so I will note that there are a few comments made that, in my opinion, seem somewhat dated. Otherwise, an excellent course and I would recommend it.
Date published: 2022-10-13
Rated 5 out of
5
by
elenairene from
So entertaining and instructive
I am sure this will be in my smaller pile of courses that I will definitely watch again my childhood love of Victorian novels made the teachers knowledge and humor especially enriching
Date published: 2022-08-03
Rated 4 out of
5
by
60s Pat from
New insight!
This series gave Me new insight into the Victorian era including human suffering, expansionism of the empire, and the horrors of war. I learned quite a bit about Queen Victoria, her rule and the nation during that time.
Date published: 2022-06-14
Rated 4 out of
5
by
GRRACINE from
Great information, but dated technology.
I like Allitt. He knows his stuff, presents well, and has a sense of humour. The Victorian era was a special time for Britain and the progress made and associated problems are articulated well. I did find that the presentation is shy on good presentation graphics. The prof relies on his text rather than pictures or videos which could have been added easily. I have the streaming version, and frequently the audio goes out of synch with the video and I have to reset.
Date published: 2022-06-01
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Timbo58 from
Interesting
I very much enjoyed this broad overview of the Victorian era. I thought the professor had a good balance on sharing narrative with sidesteps into primary documents. I want to give some credit to him before I offer some criticism. When covering such a broad subject one is limited by time. I question his conclusions on both Ireland and India and the British behavior in each place. The Irish famine was a direct result of British policy and when going through the statements made by top British officials at the time, it is clear that reducing the number of Irish persons through famine was viewed by the majority of these officials as a good thing. The kind professor in my opinion lets the British off too easily. The same could also be said about British policy in India. The other issue that I have studied somewhat is the impact of Methodism on this time period. The good professor like many other present-day scholars is far too dismissive in my opinion of the more positive and profound impact this movement had on giving the masses of persons in lower classes a discipline and framework to move themselves and their families to a better standard of living. In spite of some of these disagreements I found this course a very good overview of the period.
Date published: 2022-05-06
Overview
About
Patrick N. Allitt is Cahoon Family Professor of American History at Emory University, where he has taught since 1988. He received his PhD in American History from the University of California, Berkeley, and completed postdoctoral fellowships at Harvard Divinity School and Princeton University. He is a widely published author whose books include A Climate of Crisis: America in the Age of Environmentalism; The Conservatives: Ideas and Personalities throughout American History; and Religion in America since 1945: A History.
01: The Victorian Paradox
Britain during the age of Queen Victoria (1837-1901) is a society very close to us in many ways, and one of the first to embody the characteristic modern paradoxes with which we still deal. This makes it especially worthwhile to study....
32 min
02: Victoria's Early Reign-1837-61
The teenage girl who ascended the throne upon her uncle's death had never expected to become queen. She was crowned at a time when the monarchy was at a low ebb, yet her authority and assurance would help make her name the byword for an age....
30 min
03: The Industrial Revolution-1750-1830
Political stability and improved farming methods helped make Britain the world's first industrial country. Wealth and squalor were both much in evidence as factories, steam engines, and time clocks imposed a new order on human life....
30 min
04: Railways and Steamships
Where were the first railways in Britain-and hence the world-built? What was the "parent" technology from which they were derived? And what other advances in transport did they help lead to?...
31 min
05: Parliamentary Reform and Chartism
In 1830, only 1 in 20 Britons had the vote. There was no secret ballot, and Parliament was riddled with "rotten boroughs." The Reform Act of 1832 abolished many old constituencies, created new ones, and cautiously expanded the franchise. Chartists pushed for much more....
31 min
06: The Upper and Middle Class Woman
Courtship, marriage, and motherhood were central for women from the higher classes. Those eager for higher learning and careers faced many obstacles, but a determined few such as Florence Nightingale and George Eliot showed what could be done....
30 min
07: The Working-Class Woman
The stark contrasts in Victorian life are apparent in the lives of the poorer majority of women who had to work, almost always at difficult, low-paid, and unhealthy jobs....
31 min
08: The State Church and Evangelical Revival
Britain's established church, the Anglican Church or Church of England, felt currents of reform and evangelical revival even as it faced diverse challenges from new ideas and social conditions....
31 min
09: The Oxford Movement and Catholicism
In the 1830s and '40s, the Oxford Movement stressed the supernatural aspects of the Church of England. Two of its luminaries, Henry Manning and John Henry Newman, would become leaders of Roman Catholics in Britain....
31 min
10: Work and Working-Class Life
The Industrial Revolution did not sweep Britain evenly or all at once, though for most the mills, mines, and shops with their clocks, whistles, and machines meant a whole new-and not always welcome-way of thinking about labor and the use of time....
31 min
11: Poverty and the "Hungry Forties"
Industry and city life made poverty more visible and shocking. Utilitarianism, evangelicalism, and works of writers like Charles Dickens roused the conscience as never before. Private philanthropy strove to fill the gaps left by the New Poor Law and its system of dreaded workhouses....
30 min
12: Ireland, Famine, and Robert Peel
On "John Bull's Other Island," the potato blight that first struck in 1846 threw millions into near or absolute starvation; sparked mass migration to England, Canada, and the United States; and set off shock waves that crippled England's ruling Tory party for decades....
30 min
13: Scotland and Wales
Britain's "Celtic fringes" began to resemble England in crucial ways, witnessing the growth of industrial cities. At the same time, both the Scots and the Welsh showed a penchant for elaborate and sometimes fanciful national traditions....
30 min
14: Progress and Optimism
The Great Exhibition of 1851 and its centerpiece, the Crystal Palace, typified the Victorians' belief in improvement of all kinds, material and moral. So did Saltaire, the model workers' town built by the Yorkshire entrepreneur Titus Salt....
31 min
15: China and the Opium War
When the Manchu Dynasty barred British merchants from selling illegal but popular opium in China, the merchants called on British arms to force the trade between 1839 and 1842....
28 min
16: The Crimean War-1854-1856
Britain's first European war since Waterloo saw many "firsts." Get the inside story on the charge of the Light Brigade, the pioneering medical work of Florence Nightingale, and the investigative reporting of the London Times's W. H. Russell....
32 min
17: The Indian Mutiny-1857
In the mid-19th century, fewer than 50,000 British colonial troops and officials ruled 200 million Indians. What caused the famous sepoy rebellion? How did the British put it down? How did it change their policies toward India?...
31 min
18: Victorian Britain and the American Civil War
The war pulled Britain several ways. Economic and diplomatic interests suggested alliance with the Confederacy, but religious and humanitarian feeling backed the Union, especially after the Emancipation Proclamation....
31 min
19: The British in Africa-1840-1880
Famous explorers such as Richard Burton and David Livingstone criss-crossed Africa seeking variously to increase knowledge, preach the Christian gospel, suppress the Arab slave traders, and develop economic opportunities....
30 min
20: Victorian Literature I
Several of the greatest and best-loved writers in the history of the English language were Victorians, including Dickens, George Eliot, Trollope, and the Brontë sisters. Their works gives us a vivid picture of Victorian life....
30 min
21: Art and Music
Pre-Raphaelite painters such as Dante Gabriel Rossetti, the great critics John Ruskin and Walter Pater, and the immortal Gilbert and Sullivan-whose gently satirical operettas are splendid windows on the age-are among the characters you will meet in this lecture....
31 min
22: Science
The prestige of science and technology grew, even as the works of geologist Charles Lyell and the biologist Charles Darwin stirred intense debates over the relationship between scientific research and religious belief....
31 min
23: Medicine and Public Health
The Victorian era was a time when death at any age was a common phenomenon. Medical advances were substantial, however, with doctors becoming professionals and anesthesia, sterile procedures, and public-sanitation measures pointing the way....
31 min
24: Architecture
How did Victorian architecture-so many examples of which can still be seen around the British Isles today-reflect Victorian life and the Victorian mind? Who were the great Victorian architects, and where can you see their masterpieces?...
30 min
25: Education
Improved schooling was among the Victorians' great accomplishments: In 1830, more than half of all Britons could not read or write. By 1900, nearly everyone had at least some elementary literacy....
31 min
26: Trade Unions and the Labour Party
British workers felt a strong class solidarity out of which sprang unions and later the Labour Party, founded in 1900. Eight years earlier, unionists' votes had made Keir Hardie the first working-class MP....
32 min
27: Crime and Punishment
Crime was a grave problem for the Victorians. To deal with it, they founded the first modern police forces and prisons, and enacted reforms such as abolishing public executions and the jailing of debtors....
31 min
28: Gladstone and Disraeli-1865-1881
These two colossal figures bestrode the world of politics, setting the benchmark for all future prime ministers. Their skills enabled Britain to adjust to rapid change without the unrest that tore at other Western countries....
31 min
29: Ireland and Home Rule
Among the consequences of democratic political reforms was the rise of the Irish Home Rule Party and its charismatic leader, Charles Stewart Parnell. Parnell fell in an 1890 divorce scandal and died in 1891, but the Irish Question did not go away....
31 min
30: Democracy and Its Discontents
Gladstone and Lord Salisbury, Disraeli's successor, continued to handle Britain's growing democratization with skill. Meanwhile, the Empire grew apace, but its splendor masked underlying economic and other weaknesses....
31 min
31: The British in Africa-1880-1901
What drove Britain to become deeply involved politically from one end of the continent to the other? What did the Empire's difficult struggles with the Boer settlers of southern Africa presage?...
32 min
32: Later Victorian Literature
The late Victorian years boasted an intense concentration of brilliant authors and a series of lively, even bitter, debates about the meaning of literary art and the place of morality in it....
31 min
33: Leisure
Among other things, this talk explains why informed reflection on cricket and seaside holidays is essential if one wants to understand the Victorian soul. By their pastimes shall ye know them....
31 min
34: Domestic Servants
Domestic service employed many men, and was the commonest type of job for women in Victorian Britain. What was it like to be "downstairs," and why did late Victorians so often lament that "you can't find good help nowadays?"...
31 min
35: Victoria After Albert-1861-1901
The Queen's sorrow over losing her husband never left her. Yet she endured, and her golden (1887) and diamond (1897) jubilee celebrations occasioned great public celebrations and a festive, imperial mood in London....
30 min
36: The Victorian Legacy
Looking back at the whole period, what are some of the most striking things that leap out at us? What does reflecting on them tell us about the past, about our own day and age, and about the nature of historical understanding itself?...
31 min
