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American Engineers of the Nineteenth Century: A Biographical Index (Routledge Library Editions: Science and Technology in the Nineteenth Century #8)
by Christine Roysdon Linda A. KhatriFirst published in 1978. This biography aims solve the problem of the lack of access to information regarding American engineers and technologists of the nineteenth-century, whilst also providing opportunities for scholars to study and assess the work of hitherto little known, potentially important figures. This title will be of interest to scholars and students of science and history.
American Enlightenments: Pursuing Happiness in the Age of Reason
by Caroline WintererA provocative reassessment of the concept of an American golden age of European-born reason and intellectual curiosity in the years following the Revolutionary War The accepted myth of the "American Enlightenment" suggests that the rejection of monarchy and establishment of a new republic in the United States in the eighteenth century was the realization of utopian philosophies born in the intellectual salons of Europe and radiating outward to the New World. In this revelatory work, Stanford historian Caroline Winterer argues that a national mythology of a unitary, patriotic era of enlightenment in America was created during the Cold War to act as a shield against the threat of totalitarianism, and that Americans followed many paths toward political, religious, scientific, and artistic enlightenment in the 1700s that were influenced by European models in more complex ways than commonly thought. Winterer's book strips away our modern inventions of the American national past, exploring which of our ideas and ideals are truly rooted in the eighteenth century and which are inventions and mystifications of more recent times.
American Enterprise
by Nancy Davis Andy Serwer David Allison Peter Liebhold Kathleen G. FranzWhat does it mean to be an American? What are American ideas and values? American Enterprise, the companion book to a major exhibition at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, aims to answer these questions about the American experience through an exploration of its economic and commercial history. It argues that by looking at the intersection of capitalism and democracy, we can see where we as a nation have come from and where we might be going in the future.Richly illustrated with images of objects from the museum's collections, American Enterprise includes a 1794 dollar coin, Alexander Graham Bell's 1876 telephone, a brass cash register from Marshall Fields, Sam Walton's cap, and many other goods and services that have shaped American culture. Historical and contemporary advertisements are also featured, emphasizing the evolution of the relationship between producers and consumers over time. Interspersed in the historical narrative are essays from today's industry leaders--including Sheila Bair, Adam Davidson, Bill Ford, Sally Greenberg, Fisk Johnson, Hank Paulson, Richard Trumka, and Pat Woertz--that pose provocative questions about the state of contemporary American business and society. American Enterprise is a multi-faceted survey of the nation's business heritage and corresponding social effects that is fundamental to an understanding of the lives of the American people, the history of the United States, and the nation's role in global affairs.
American Entrepreneur: How 400 Years of Risk-Takers, Innovators, and Business Visionaries Built the U.S.A.
by William Doyle Willie RobertsonAmerica is the ultimate start-up venture – and these are the heroes who made it happenThe history of the United States is, to a remarkable degree, the story of its entrepreneurs, those daring movers and shakers who dreamed big and risked everything to build better lives for themselves and their fellow Americans. Drawing on his own family's remarkable journey, Duck Commander CEO and star of the blockbuster Duck Dynasty series Willie Robertson tells the captivating true tale of the visionaries and doers who have embodied the American dream.We begin with the first American entrepreneurs, the Native Americans, who established a highly sophisticated commercial network across the land in the precolonial days. The original Founding Father, George Washington, was also a founding entrepreneur, at the head of a thriving agribusiness venture that gave him the executive skills to steer the nation through the darkest hours of the American Revolution. Then, of course, there were the mega entrepreneurs, legendary figures like Astor, Vanderbilt, Carnegie, and Rockefeller, who transformed America, connected the country with miles of railroad track and supplied the fuel and steel that would help make America the most powerful nation on earth. And in recent years, business visionaries like Jobs, Gates, and Zuckerberg—not to mention the thousands of equally vital, yet smaller-scale, operators who spring up every year—have ushered America into the twenty-first century.American Entrepreneur also relates the story of the Robertson family business, telling how Willie’s family turned a humble regional duck call manufacturer, founded by his father, Phil, into an international powerhouse brand. From a young age, Willie had the entrepreneurial bug, buying candy in bulk and hawking it on the school bus. He did special orders and earned a small fortune for a ten-year-old—until he was hauled into the principal’s office and told to knock it off. So he transferred his focus to Phil’s fledgling business, helping in whatever way he could, from folding endless numbers of cardboard boxes to acting as the company’s customer service department—though he still wasn’t out of grade school. Willie helped build Duck Commander, which he now runs, into a worldwide brand, culminating in the mega success of the Duck Dynasty television show.American Entrepreneur tells a most American tale, of those among us who, through their vision, ingenuity, and good old-fashioned hard work, made something that changed the world.
American Entrepreneur: The Fascinating Stories of the People Who Defined Business in the United States
by Larry Schweikart Lynne Pierson DotiThis book vividly illustrates the history of business in the United States from the point of view of the enterprising men and women who made it happen.Ever since the first colonists landed in the New World, Americans have forged ahead in their quest to make good on promises of capitalism and independence. Weaving stirring narrative with economic analysis, this historical deep dive recounts the successes and failures of some of the most iconic business people to grace our history books--from the founding of our country to the present day.In American Entrepreneur, you&’ll learn about how:Eli Whitney changed the shape of the American business landscape;the Civil War impacted the economy, and how it was renewed by the subsequent dominance of Andrew Carnegie and J. P. Morgan;Asa Candler, W. K. Kellogg, Henry Ford, and J.C. Penney led the rise of the consumer marketplace;and Warren Buffett&’s, Michael Milken&’s, and Martha Stewart&’s experience in the &“New Economy&” in the 1990s--and how that economy continues today.It is an adventure to start a business, and the greatest risk takers in that adventure are entrepreneurs. This is the epic story of America&’s entrepreneurs and how they created the economy we enjoy today.
American Environmental History (Wiley Blackwell Readers in American Social and Cultural History)
by Louis S. WarrenExplore how the peoples of America understood and changed their natural environments, remaking their politics, culture, and societies In this newly revised Second Edition of American Environmental History, celebrated environmental historian and author Louis S. Warren provides readers with insightful examination of how different American peoples created and reacted to environmental change and threats from the era before Columbus to the COVID-19 pandemic. You'll find concise editorial introductions to each chapter and interpretive interventions throughout this meticulous collection of essays and historical documents. This book covers topics as varied as Native American relations with nature, colonial invasions, American slavery, market expansion and species destruction, urbanization, Progressive and New Deal conservation, national parks, the environmental impact of consumer appetites, environmentalism and the backlash against it, environmental justice, and climate change. This new edition includes twice as many primary documents as the First Edition, along with findings from related fields such as Native American history, African American history, geography, and environmental justice. Ideal for students and researchers studying American environmental history and for those seeking historical perspectives on contemporary environmental challenges, this book will earn a place in the libraries of anyone with an interest in American history and the impact of American peoples on the environment and the world around them. Louis S. Warren is the W. Turrentine Jackson Professor of Western U.S. History at the University of California, Davis. He is a two-time winner of the Caughey Western History Association Prize, a Guggenheim Fellow, and recipient of the Albert Beveridge Award of the American Historical Association and the Bancroft Prize in American History.
American Environmental History: An Introduction (Columbia Guides to American History and Cultures)
by Carolyn MerchantBy studying the many ways diverse peoples have changed, shaped, and conserved the natural world over time, environmental historians provide insight into humanity's unique relationship with nature and, more importantly, are better able to understand the origins of our current environmental crisis. <P><P>Beginning with the precolonial land-use practice of Native Americans and concluding with our twenty-first century concerns over our global ecological crisis, American Environmental History addresses contentious issues such as the preservation of the wilderness, the expulsion of native peoples from national parks, and population growth, and considers the formative forces of gender, race, and class. Entries address a range of topics, from the impact of rice cultivation, slavery, and the growth of the automobile suburb to the effects of the Russian sea otter trade, Columbia River salmon fisheries, the environmental justice movement, and globalization. This illustrated reference is an essential companion for students interested in the ongoing transformation of the American landscape and the conflicts over its resources and conservation. It makes rich use of the tools and resources (climatic and geological data, court records, archaeological digs, and the writings of naturalists) that environmental historians rely on to conduct their research. The volume also includes a compendium of significant people, concepts, events, agencies, and legislation, and an extensive bibliography of critical films, books, and Web sites.
American Epic: The First Time America Heard Itself
by Elijah Wald Allison Mcgourty Bernard MacmahonThe companion book to the groundbreaking PBS and BBC documentary series celebrating the pioneers and artists of American roots music—blues, gospel, folk, Cajun, Appalachian, Hawaiian, Native American—without which there would be no jazz, rock, country R&B, or hip hop today.Jack White, T. Bone Burnett, and Robert Redford have teamed up to executive produce American Epic, a historical music project exploring the pivotal recording journeys of the early twentieth century, which for the first time captured the breadth of American music and made it available to the world. It was, in a very real way, the first time America truly heard herself. In the 1920s and 1930s, as radio took over the pop music business, record companies were forced to leave their studios in major cities in search of new styles and markets. Ranging the mountains, prairies, rural villages, and urban ghettos of America, they discovered a wealth of unexpected talent—farmers, laborers, and ethnic minorities playing styles that blended the intertwining strands of Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas. These recordings form the bedrock for modern music as we know it, but during the Depression many record companies went out of business and more than ninety percent of the fragile 78 rpm discs were destroyed. Fortunately, thanks to the continuing efforts of cultural detectives and record devotees, the stories of America’s earliest musicians can finally be told. Bernard MacMahon and Allison McGourty, who directed and produced the documentary with American musician Duke Erikson, spent years traveling around the US in search of recollections of those musical pioneers. Their fascinating account, written with the assistance of prize-winning author Elijah Wald, continues the journey of the series and features additional stories, never-before-seen photographs, and unearthed artwork. It also contains contributions from many of the musicians who participated including Taj Mahal, Nas, Willie Nelson, and Steve Martin, plus a behind-the-scenes look at the incredible journey across America. American Epic is an extraordinary testament to our country’s musical roots, the transformation of our culture, and the artists who gave us modern popular music.
American Evangelicals in Egypt: Missionary Encounters in an Age of Empire (Jews, Christians, and Muslims from the Ancient to the Modern World #56)
by Heather J. SharkeyIn 1854, American Presbyterian missionaries arrived in Egypt as part of a larger Anglo-American Protestant movement aiming for worldwide evangelization. Protected by British imperial power, and later by mounting American global influence, their enterprise flourished during the next century. American Evangelicals in Egypt follows the ongoing and often unexpected transformations initiated by missionary activities between the mid-nineteenth century and 1967--when the Six-Day Arab-Israeli War uprooted the Americans in Egypt. Heather Sharkey uses Arabic and English sources to shed light on the many facets of missionary encounters with Egyptians. These occurred through institutions, such as schools and hospitals, and through literacy programs and rural development projects that anticipated later efforts of NGOs. To Egyptian Muslims and Coptic Christians, missionaries presented new models for civic participation and for women's roles in collective worship and community life. At the same time, missionary efforts to convert Muslims and reform Copts stimulated new forms of Egyptian social activism and prompted nationalists to enact laws restricting missionary activities. Faced by Islamic strictures and customs regarding apostasy and conversion, and by expectations regarding the proper structure of Christian-Muslim relations, missionaries in Egypt set off debates about religious liberty that reverberate even today. Ultimately, the missionary experience in Egypt led to reconsiderations of mission policy and evangelism in ways that had long-term repercussions for the culture of American Protestantism.
American Evita: Hillary Clinton's Path to Power
by Christopher Andersen"I don't quit. I keep going."–Hillary Rodham ClintonShe is, quite simply, the most famous, most complex, most loved/hated/admired/reviled woman -- perhaps person -- in America. And, whether she fulfills her life's ambition or not, she can already lay claim to being the first woman ever considered a serious contender for the presidency.From the beginning, there have been the inevitable comparisons to Argentina's legendary Eva Perón. Sex, power, money, lies, scandal, tragedy, and betrayal were the things that defined the lives of both women. Yet most of what we know about Hillary Rodham Clinton is seen in the context of her tumultuous marriage to the 42nd President. Now a power in the Senate, Hillary waits for the right moment to make her own run for the White House. In the style of his #l New York Times bestsellers The Day Diana Died and The Day John Died, as well as Jack and Jackie, Jackie After Jack, George and Laura and Sweet Caroline, Christopher Andersen draws on important sources -- many speaking here for the first time -- to paint a startling portrait of America's most controversial woman. Among the revelations:How U.S. history has been shaped -- and will continue to be shaped -- by the arrangement between Hillary and Bill known as "The Plan."Important new details about the role Hillary played in the scandalous eleventh hour pardons of armed radicals, drug dealers, tax cheats, embezzlers, money launderers and more.How the outgoing First Lady registered like a bride at a gift store and left the White House with $400,000 worth of "gifts" belonging to the American people.How JFK Jr. almost thwarted her Senate plans.New details about Hillary's relationship with Vince Foster.How Hillary has coped with Bill's hundreds of affairs, and the new women in her husband's life.What Martha Stewart did for Hillary, and how Hillary repaid her.How Hillary is using the 2004 elections as a springboard to her own future presidential candidacy—regardless of who wins.Whatever the ultimate judgment of history, the ongoing saga of Hillary Clinton's inexorable rise to power continues to stir passions, and to make her the American Evita.
American Exception: Empire and the Deep State
by Aaron GoodAmerican Exception seeks to explain the breakdown of US democracy. In particular, how we can understand the uncanny continuity of American foreign policy, the breakdown of the rule of law, and the extreme concentration of wealth and power into an overworld of the corporate rich. To trace the evolution of the American state, the author takes a deep politics approach, shedding light on those political practices that are typically repressed in &“mainstream&” discourse. In its long history before World War II, the US had a deep political system—a system of governance in which decision-making and enforcement were carried out within—and outside of—public institutions. It was a system that always included some degree of secretive collusion and law-breaking. After World War II, US elites decided to pursue global dominance over the international capitalist system. Setting aside the liberal rhetoric, this project was pursued in a manner that was by and large imperialistic rather than progressive. To administer this covert empire, US elites created a massive national security state characterized by unprecedented levels of secrecy and lawlessness. The &“Global Communist Conspiracy&” provided a pretext for exceptionism—an endless &“exception&” to the rule of law. What gradually emerged after World War II was a tripartite state system of governance. The open democratic state and the authoritarian security state were both increasingly dominated by an American deep state. The term deep state was badly misappropriated during the Trump era. In the simplest sense, it herein refers to all those institutions that collectively exercise undemocratic power over state and society. To trace how we arrived at this point, American Exception explores various deep state institutions and history-making interventions. Key institutions involve the relationships between the overworld of the corporate rich, the underworld of organized crime, and the national security actors that mediate between them. History-making interventions include the toppling of foreign governments, the launching of aggressive wars, and the political assassinations of the 1960s. The book concludes by assessing the prospects for a revival of US democracy.
American Exceptionalism Vol 1
by Timothy RobertsAmerican exceptionalism � the idea that America is fundamentally distinct from other nations � is a philosophy that has dominated economics, politics, religion and culture for two centuries. This collection of primary source material seeks to understand how this belief began, how it developed and why it remains popular.
American Exceptionalism Vol 2
by Timothy RobertsAmerican exceptionalism � the idea that America is fundamentally distinct from other nations � is a philosophy that has dominated economics, politics, religion and culture for two centuries. This collection of primary source material seeks to understand how this belief began, how it developed and why it remains popular.
American Exceptionalism Vol 3
by Timothy RobertsAmerican exceptionalism � the idea that America is fundamentally distinct from other nations � is a philosophy that has dominated economics, politics, religion and culture for two centuries. This collection of primary source material seeks to understand how this belief began, how it developed and why it remains popular.
American Exceptionalism Vol 4
by Timothy RobertsAmerican exceptionalism � the idea that America is fundamentally distinct from other nations � is a philosophy that has dominated economics, politics, religion and culture for two centuries. This collection of primary source material seeks to understand how this belief began, how it developed and why it remains popular.
American Exceptionalism and American Innocence: A People's History of Fake News—From the Revolutionary War to the War on Terror
by Sirvent Roberto Haiphong DannyDid the U.S. really “save the world” in World War II? Should black athletes stop protesting and show more gratitude for what America has done for them? Are wars fought to spread freedom and democracy? Or is this all fake news?American Exceptionalism and American Innocence examines the stories we’re told that lead us to think that the U.S. is a force for good in the world, regardless of slavery, the genocide of indigenous people, and the more than a century’s worth of imperialist war that the U.S. has wrought on the planet. Sirvent and Haiphong detail just what Captain America’s shield tells us about the pretensions of U.S. foreign policy, how Angelina Jolie and Bill Gates engage in humanitarian imperialism, and why the Broadway musical Hamilton is a monument to white supremacy.
American Exceptionalism and Civil Religion: Reassessing the History of an Idea
by John Fea John D. WilseyEver since John Winthrop told his fellow colonists in 1630 that they were about to establish a City upon a Hill, the idea of having a special place in history has captured the American imagination. Through centuries of crises and opportunities, many have taken up this theme to inspire the nation. But others have criticized the notion because it implies a sense of superiority which can fuel racism, warmongering and even idolatry. In this remarkable book, John Wilsey traces the historical development of exceptionalism, including its theological meaning and implications for civil religion. From seventeenth-century Puritans to twentieth-century industrialists, from politicians to educators, exceptionalism does not appear as a monolithic concept to be either totally rejected or devotedly embraced. While it can lead to abuses, it can also point to constructive civil engagement and human flourishing. This book considers historically and theologically what makes the difference. Neither the term nor the idea of American exceptionalism is going away. John Wilsey's careful history and analysis will therefore prove an important touchstone for discussions of American identity in the decades to come.
American Exceptionalism and the Remains of Race: Multicultural Exorcisms (Routledge Series on Identity Politics #10)
by Edmund FongIn contemporary American political culture, claims of American exceptionalism and anxieties over its prospects have resurged as an overarching theme in national political discourse. Yet never very far from such debates lie animating fears associated with race. Fears about the loss of national unity and trust often draw attention to looming changes in the racial demographics of the body politic. Lost amid these debates are often the more complex legacies of racial hybridity. Anxieties over the disintegration of the fabric of American national identity likewise forget not just how they echo past fears of subversive racial and cultural difference, but also exorcise as well the changing nature of work and social interaction. Edmund Fong’s book examines the rise and resurgence of contemporary forms of American exceptionalism as they have emerged out of contentious debates over cultural pluralism and multicultural diversity in the past two decades. For a brief time, serious considerations of the force of multiculturalism entered into a variety of philosophical and policy debates. But in the American context, these debates often led to a reaffirmation of some variant of American exceptionalism with the consequent exorcism of race within the avowed norms and policy goals of American politics. Fong explores how this "multicultural exorcism" revitalizing American exceptionalism is not simply a novel feature of our contemporary political moment, but is instead a recurrent dynamic across the history of American political discourse. By situating contemporary discourse on cultural pluralism within the larger frame of American history, this book yields insight into the production of hegemonic forms of American exceptionalism and how race continues to haunt the contours of American national identity.
American Exceptionalism in the Age of Obama (Routledge Research in American Politics and Governance)
by Stephen BrooksThe election of President Obama in 2008 and the apparent decline of American power in the world has rekindled an old and important debate. Is the United States exceptional in its values and institutions, as well as in the role that it is destined to play in world affairs? In this book, Stephen Brooks argues that American exceptionalism has been and continues to be real. In making this argument he focuses on five aspects of American politics and society that are most crucial to an understanding of American exceptionalism today. They include the appropriate relationship between the state and citizens, religion, socio-economic mobility, America’s role in the world, and ideas about the Constitution. American exceptionalism matters in domestic politics chiefly as a political narrative around which support for and opposition to certain policies, values and vision of American society coalesce. But in world affairs it is not the story but the empirical reality of American exceptionalism that matters. Although the long era of America’s global economic dominance has entered what might be called a period of diminished expectations, the United States remains exceptional—the indispensable nation—in world affairs and is likely to remain so for many years to come.
American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea
by Ian TyrrellA powerful dissection of a core American myth. The idea that the United States is unlike every other country in world history is a surprisingly resilient one. Throughout his distinguished career, Ian Tyrrell has been one of the most influential historians of the idea of American exceptionalism, but he has never written a book focused solely on it until now. The notion that American identity might be exceptional emerged, Tyrrell shows, from the belief that the nascent early republic was not simply a postcolonial state but a genuinely new experiment in an imperialist world dominated by Britain. Prior to the Civil War, American exceptionalism fostered declarations of cultural, economic, and spatial independence. As the country grew in population and size, becoming a major player in the global order, its exceptionalist beliefs came more and more into focus—and into question. Over time, a political divide emerged: those who believed that America’s exceptionalism was the basis of its virtue and those who saw America as either a long way from perfect or actually fully unexceptional, and thus subject to universal demands for justice. Tyrrell masterfully articulates the many forces that made American exceptionalism such a divisive and definitional concept. Today, he notes, the demands that people acknowledge America’s exceptionalism have grown ever more strident, even as the material and moral evidence for that exceptionalism—to the extent that there ever was any—has withered away.
American Exceptionalism: Economics, Finance, Political Economy, and Economic Laws
by Michael Szenberg Lall RamrattanThe publication of Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America has kindled interest across disciplines to appraise the exceptional nature of U.S. activities. In general, however, all the published works have not focused their analyses from an economic point of view. While economics was for some a “dismal science” following Thomas Carlyle’s characterization of Malthus’ demographic model, it has increasingly become the “queen of the social sciences” for more practitioners. The book fills a gap in the literature by describing the American contributors as precursors and genuinely exceptional economists. We present their works within the state of the nation in which they advance their discipline.One is treated to both qualitative and quantitative theories in the opening chapter. Budding theories that became established theories of Economics and Finance are investigated in Chapters II and III. When President John Adams was confronted with M. Turgot’s criticisms of the American government, he resorted to a historic survey of types of government from ancient Greece to the Middle Ages. Similarly, we have included a final chapter, Chapter IV, to present the argument for American Exceptionalism in the domain of Political Economy and Economic Law over the ages.
American Exceptionalisms: From Winthrop to Winfrey
by James Taylor Carson Sylvia SöderlindAn incisive and wide ranging look at a powerful force and myth in American culture and history, American Exceptionalisms reveals the centuries-old persistence of the notion that the United States is an exceptional nation, in being both an example to the world and exempt from the rules of international law. Scholars from North America and Europe trace versions of the rhetoric of exceptionalism through a multitude of historical, cultural, and political phenomena, from John Winthrop's vision of the "cittie on a hill" and the Salem witch trials in the seventeenth century to The Blair Witch Project and Oprah Winfrey's "Child Predator Watch List" in the twenty-first century. The first set of essays focus on constitutive historical moments in the development of the myth, rom early exploration narratives through political debates in the early republic to twentieth-century immigration debates. The latter essays address the role of exceptionalism in the "war on terror" and such cornerstones of modern popular culture such as the horror stories of H.P. Lovecraft, the songs of Steve Earle, and the Oprah Winfrey show.Sylvia Söderlind is Associate Professor of English Language and Literature at Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada. She is the author of Margin/Alias: Language and Colonization in Canadian and Québécois Fiction (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1991) and articles on American, Canadian and Québécois fiction, "ghostmodernism" and translation, and the politics of metaphor published in, among others, Canadian Review of Comparative Literature, Ariel, Essays in Canadian Writing, Voix et images, RS/SI, New Feminism Review (Japan), ARTES (Sweden).James Taylor Carson is Professor of History and Associate Dean in the Faculty of Arts and Science at Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada. His scholarship focuses on the ethnohistory of native peoples in the American South, and he has published two books on the subject, Searching for the Bright Path: The Mississippi Choctaws from Prehistory to Removal (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1999) and Making an Atlantic World: Circles, Paths, and Stories from the Colonial South (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2007).
American Exodus: Second-Generation Chinese Americans in China, 1901–1949
by Charlotte BrooksIn the first decades of the 20th century, almost half of the Chinese Americans born in the United States moved to China—a relocation they assumed would be permanent. At a time when people from around the world flocked to the United States, this little-noticed emigration belied America’s image as a magnet for immigrants and a land of upward mobility for all. Fleeing racism, Chinese Americans who sought greater opportunities saw China, a tottering empire and then a struggling republic, as their promised land. American Exodus is the first book to explore this extraordinary migration of Chinese Americans. Their exodus shaped Sino-American relations, the development of key economic sectors in China, the character of social life in its coastal cities, debates about the meaning of culture and “modernity” there, and the U.S. government’s approach to citizenship and expatriation in the interwar years. Spanning multiple fields, exploring numerous cities, and crisscrossing the Pacific Ocean, this book will appeal to anyone interested in Chinese history, international relations, immigration history, and Asian American studies.
American Exodus: The Dust Bowl Migration And Okie Culture In California
by James N. GregoryFifty years ago, John Steinbeck's now classic novel, The Grapes of Wrath, captured the epic story of an Oklahoma farm family driven west to California by dust storms, drought, and economic hardship. It was a story that generations of Americans have also come to know through Dorothea Lange's unforgettable photos of migrant families struggling to make a living in Depression-torn California. Now in James N. Gregory's pathbreaking American Exodus, there is at last an historical study that moves beyond the fiction and the photographs to uncover the full meaning of these events. American Exodus takes us back to the Dust Bowl migration of the 1930s and the war boom influx of the 1940s to explore the experiences of the more than one million Oklahomans, Arkansans, Texans, and Missourians who sought opportunities in California. Gregory reaches into the migrants' lives to reveal not only their economic trials but also their impact on California's culture and society. He tracesthe development of an "Okie subculture" that over the years has grown into an essential element in California's cultural landscape. The consequences, however, reach far beyond California. The Dust Bowl migration was part of a larger heartland diaspora that has sent millions of Southerners and rural Midwesterners to the nation's northern and western industrial perimeter. American Exodus is the first book to examine the cultural implications of that massive 20th-century population shift. In this rich account of the experiences and impact of these migrant heartlanders, Gregory fills an important gap in recent American social history.
American Expansionism, 1783-1860: A Manifest Destiny? (Seminar Studies)
by Mark JoyThis new Seminar Study surveys the history of U.S. territorial expansion from the end of the American Revolution until 1860. The book explores the concept of 'manifest destiny' and asks why, if expansion was 'manifest', there was such opposition to almost every expansionist incident. Paying attention to key themes often overlooked - Indian removal and the US government land sales policy, the book looks at both 'foreign' expansion such as the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, and the war with Mexico in the 1840s and 'internal' expansion as American settlers moved west .Finally, the book addresses the most recent historiographical trends in the subject and asks how Americans have dealt with the expansionist legacy.