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Hello all,

 

  I'm looking to supplement a get it done economics curriculum with historical fiction that would teach economics concepts.  Could you all please help me out??? Thanks so much! Oh, and if some are juvenile fiction that's fine too.

 

Here are the topics I'm trying to cover...

 

US Founding

 

Pre Industrial Revolution

 

Post Industrial Revolution

 

Great Depression

 

Communism

 

A broad sampling of world history focusing on economic development

 

I have thought of several books...

 

Pride and Prejudice or Mansfield Park

The Great Gatsby

The Merchant of Venice

Animal Farm

The Grapes of Wrath

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by dovrar
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Novels by John Dos Passos to show a pro socialist spin.

 

North and South by Eliabeth Gaskell -beginning of industrial revolution in England.

 

For non-fiction Salt by ???? Mark somebody. Anyway it is a fascinating history of this ever necessary commodity and how trade developed around it.

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Gone with the Wind is very much centered around the idea of money.  

Edith Wharton's novels discuss the differences between class and wealth.  I read The House of Mirth this year and like Gone with the Wind, it is very much about a woman's quest for financial security and what she is willing to sacrifice to get that.

 

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is a fantastic view of poor urban, recent immigrant life just before WW2 (the novel ends near the beginning of US involvement in the war).

 

James Mitchener as been somewhat forgotten.  His novels often use economic development as a stimulus for exploration, colonization and industrialization.  Hawaii or Centennial might both be good options.  

 

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry - Depression Era South.  Economics of share cropping. The prequel The Land is also really good.  (I've loved pretty much every book by this author I've read.  My mom grew up on a farm in the Pacific Northwest.  These books helped me picture the levels of poverty that she grew up in.)

 

 

 

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It's been years since I read this, but I remember (hopefully correctly!) the mom calculating what price the crop should bring, considering multiple factors - maybe that will work for you.

 

Little Britches: Father and I Were Ranchers is an autobiographical account of Ralph Moody's (1898–1982) early life in the vicinity of Littleton, Colorado. This is the first book in the very popular series on Moody's life. This book has been in print continuously since 1950.

One valued lesson passed on by Moody is the importance of water rights and the profound challenges these can have on a community.

This book spans the years from 1906 to 1910. Moody was eight when his father moved to Colorado, and eleven when his father died.

 

 

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How about The Jungle?

 

When I read the OP, The Jungle is the first thing that came to mind.  If it's going to be read in an economics context, I would balance that with reading about "the tragedy of the commons," which could be studied anywhere from under an hour to a week. 

 

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