{"product_id":"9780814752548","title":"On the Make: Clerks and the Quest for Capital in Nineteenth-Century America","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn the bustling cities of the mid-nineteenth-century Northeast, young male clerks working in commercial offices and stores were on the make, persistently seeking wealth, respect, and self-gratification. Yet these strivers and \"counter jumpers\" discovered that claiming the identities of independent men—while making sense of a volatile capitalist economy and fluid urban society—was fraught with uncertainty.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn \u003cb\u003eOn the Make\u003c\/b\u003e, Brian P. Luskey illuminates at once the power of the ideology of self-making and the important contests over the meanings of respectability, manhood, and citizenship that helped to determine who clerks were and who they would become. Drawing from a rich array of archival materials, including clerks’ diaries, newspapers, credit reports, census data, advice literature, and fiction, Luskey argues that a better understanding of clerks and clerking helps make sense of the culture of capitalism and the society it shaped in this pivotal era.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"New York University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47119405514992,"sku":"9780814752548","price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9780814752548_p0.jpg?v=1763746255","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9780814752548","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}