“How Americans Fought the Stamp Act with Memes,” 9 Aug.

On Monday, 9 August, I’ll deliver an online talk to the Paoli Battlefield Preservation Fund on “How Americans Fought the Stamp Act with Memes.”

Here’s our event description:

The word “meme” is a modern coinage expressing how ideas replicate, spread, and mutate like genes, and the conflict over the Stamp Act shows memes at work in the Revolutionary era.

When news of the new tax arrived in North America in the spring of 1765, it produced an unprecedented wave of protests. Colonial politicians and printers promoted that opposition with slogans like “Sons of Liberty,” repurposed images like the “Join, Or Die” snake, and a radical new form of outdoor political protest that edged into riots. As those activities spread from colony to colony, they created the first continental resistance to imperial policy.

How effective was the anti-Stamp campaign, what problems did it cause colonial leaders, and what new ideas did it establish for the next imperial dispute?

I’m still honing my talk, but it could take in fake news about Patrick Henry, Benjamin Franklin’s bad timing, and Richard Henry Lee leading a procession of his slaves while dressed as a clergyman.

Sign up for this event here, and learn more about the Paoli Battlefield while you’re at it.