Rhetoric and Identity in Absalom Jones and Richard Allen's Narrative
Rhetoric and Identity in Absalom Jones and RichardAllen's Narrative of the Proceedings of the Black People, During the Late Awful Calamity in Philadelphia HE DEADLY YELLOW FEVER epidemic that devastated the citizenry Tof Philadelphia in 1793 has been studied by historians from a variety of perspectives, illuminating diverse aspects of late eighteenth-century American life, including medicine, morality, politics, urban society, and the press.' One significant aspect of the epidemic that has been relatively neglected, however, is the role of African American Philadelphians who served the sick and the public response to their efforts. The author would like to acknowledge the assistance of Glen McClish, Gary and Wynne Bacon, Gary Nash, and the anonymous reviewer for PMHB. 'Stc, for example, David Pad Nord, "Readership as Citizenship in Late-Eighteenth-Century Philadelphia." in A Melancholy Scene of Dcvaradon: The Public Response to the 1793 Philacphia Yellow Fever Epidemni, ed. J. Worth Estes and Billy G. Smith (Canton, Mass., 1997), 19-44; Jacquelyn C. Miller, "Passions and Politics: The Multiple Meanings of Benjamin Rush's Treatment for Yellow Fever," in Melancholy Sccne, 79-95; Jacquelyn C. Miller, "An Uncommon Tranquility of M d Emotional Self-Control and the Constnuction of a Middle-Class Identity in Eighteenth-Century Philadelphia," Journal of Social History 30 (1996), 129-48; Martin S. Pemick, "Politics, Parties, and Pestilence: Epidemic Yellow Fever in Philadelphia and the Rise of the First Party System," William and May Qparterly29 (1972), 559-86; J. H. Powell, Bring Out Your Dead: The Great Plague of Yellow Fever in Philadelphiain 1793 (Philadelphia, 1949); Mark Workman, "Medical Practice in Philadelphia at the Time of the Yellow Fever Epidemic, 1793," Pennsylvania Folkhif 27 (1978), 33-39; Eve Kornfied, "Crisis in the Capital The Cultural Significance of Philadelphia*s Great Yellow Fever Epidemic," Pennsylvania History 51 (1984), 189-205; Mark A.
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