Jersey: A Sense of Place

As many readers of this blog know, the idea of "place" was a dominant theme in my first book, The Way of Improvement Leads Home: Philip Vickers Fithian and the Rural Enlightenment in America (University of Pennsylvania Press). In that book I chronicled Fithian's deep sense of attachment to his home on the Cohansey River in eighteenth-century Cumberland County, New Jersey.  Many readers of the book who know me well have remarked that my connection to my New Jersey roots is evident throughout the narrative. I can't disagree.

I think a good argument could be made that Fithian was the first New Jersey writer to reflect deeply on a sense of place in this colony/state.

So needless to say I was thrilled to see that Montclair State University is sponsoring a year-long series of lectures and presentations entitled "Jersey: A Sense of Place."  If you are in the Montclair area tonight you should definitely check out Louis Masur's lecture "Talk about a dream:' Bruce Springsteen's American Vision--from New Jersey to the World."  Masur is the author of Runaway Dream: Born to Run and Bruce Springsteen's American Vision and is co-editor of the recently released Talk About a Dream: The Essential Interviews of Bruce Springsteen.

Learn more about the series here and here.