Transatlantic Threads

Reviews / Votes

Transatlantic Threads offers an innovative analysis of the role of linen in eighteenth-century Scottish society and the Atlantic economy. By focusing on coarse linen, Sally Tuckett imaginatively brings together dress, economic and social history, and the study of slavery in the eighteenth-century Atlantic world. She shows how linen was the fibre and fabric of choice for young and old, free and enslaved, linking Scotland to a wider British imperial remit. -- Giorgio Riello, European University Institute Transatlantic Threads is an exemplary textile history, recovering the deepest structures of eighteenth-century economy, culture, and social life. The sustained attention to enslaved wearers and the place of Scottish linen in the Atlantic colonial system gives this book an unrivalled urgency while also showcasing Sally Tuckett's scholarly skill and agility. -- Seth Rockman, Brown University, USA. Author of Plantation Goods: A Material History of American Slavery Sally Tuckett's pathbreaking Transatlantic Threads reveals how a humble textile - linen - carved out a place for Scottish exports in the fast-growing British imperial economy of the eighteenth century. Adopting a novel approach that links people, places and things, Tuckett follows Scottish linen's journey from flax to fabric, from the hands of Highland girls learning to spin to the backs of enslaved Africans clothed in coarse linen shirting as they toiled in the tobacco fields of Virginia. -- John Styles, Professor Emeritus in History, University of Hertfordshire Transatlantic Threads is truly an impressive and meticulously researched treatise on the making, meaning and flow of 18th Century Scottish Linen across the Atlantic. The text fills gaps in the scholarship on linen in the Atlantic diaspora and contributes significant insights into to the meaning of this important trade cloth in the transatlantic context. It highlights linen material as a connecting thread between people and places and informs our understanding of the people and societies who produced, disseminated, and consumed linen material. This path-breaking text is an essential read for scholars and students of Transatlantic studies, Material Culture studies and Textile history. -- Steeve Buckridge, Grand State Valley University