Synopses & Reviews
View the
Table of Contents. Read the
Introduction.
"A masterful introduction to a new kind of history, one that looks to the past to illuminate the most basic aspects of contemporary behavior, from parenting practices and consumer behavior to the rise of the hospice and the growing acceptance of oral sex. This is one of those seminal books that radically transforms the way we look at the present and the past."
Steven Mintz, author of Huck's Raft: A History of American Childhood
"As always, Peter Stearns stimulates our thinking about history and human experience in important ways. American Behavioral History is unconventional, provocative, and compelling. This collection gives new vigor to the study of social history."
Joan Jacobs Brumberg, author of The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls
"Peter Stearns and his intrepid co-conspirators do not, like other seekers of truth in history, try to understand the past in its own terms. Instead, they try to learn from the past to touch the present and affect the future. One after another, their extraordinary essays suggest that their audacious ambition may be attainable."
Michael Zuckerman, author of Almost Chosen People: Oblique Biographies in the American Grain
"Stearns and his colleagues leave us with a compelling sense that we need history to understand ourselves. Without an engaged historical perspective on today's behaviors, prescriptions for social change will not only fail, but leave us vulnerable to quick fixes and moral zealotry, sparking social behaviorsincidentally, with a rich American pastwhose history might assist us in our efforts to understand today's cultural and political climate, and, perhaps, begin to change it."
Journal of American History
From his founding of The Journal of Social History to his groundbreaking work on the history of emotions, weight, and parenting, Peter N. Stearns has pushed the boundaries of social history to new levels, presenting new insights into how people have lived and thought through the ages. Having established the history of emotions as a major subfield of social history, Stearns and his collaborators are poised to do the same thing with the study of human behavior. This is their manifesto.
American Behavioral History deals with specific uses of historical data and analysis to illuminate American behavior patterns, ranging from car buying rituals to sexuality, and from funeral practices to contemporary grandparenting. The anthology illustrates the advantages and parameters of analyzing the ways in which people behave, and adds significantly to our social understanding while developing innovative methods for historical teaching and research.
At its core, the collection demonstrates how the study of the past can be directly used to understand current behaviors in the United States. Throughout, contributors discuss not only specific behavioral patterns but, importantly, how to consider and interpret them as vital historical sources.
Contributors include Gary Cross, Paula Fass, Linda Rosenzweig, Susan Matt, Steven M. Gelber, Peter N. Stearns, Suzanne Smith, Mark M. Smith, Kevin White.
Review
“A masterful introduction to a new kind of history, one that looks to the past to illuminate the most basic aspects of contemporary behavior, from parenting practices and consumer behavior to the rise of the hospice and the growing acceptance of oral sex. This is one of those seminal books that radically transforms the way we look at the present and the past.”
“Contextually rich, in-depth and well argued.”
“As always, Peter Stearns stimulates our thinking about history and human experience in important ways. American Behavioral History is unconventional, provocative, and compelling. This collection gives new vigor to the study of social history.”
“Peter Stearns and his intrepid co-conspirators do not, like other seekers of truth in history, try to understand the past in its own terms. Instead, they try to learn from the past to touch the present and affect the future. One after another, their extraordinary essays suggest that their audacious ambition may be attainable.”
“Stearns and his colleagues leave us with a compelling sense that we need history to understand ourselves. Without an engaged historical perspective on today's behaviors, prescriptions for social change will not only fail, but leave us vulnerable to quick fixes and moral zealotry, sparking social behaviors—;incidentally, with a rich American past—;whose history might assist us in our efforts to understand today's cultural and political climate, and, perhaps, begin to change it.”
Review
"The volume effectively challenges accepted notions of "race" and "racial equality" and considers the long-term effects of the struggle on its participants, tracing the development of African-American political thought since the 1960s." -Orlando Times,
Review
“Contextually rich, in-depth and well argued.”
-Journal of Social History,
Review
“As always, Peter Stearns stimulates our thinking about history and human experience in important ways. American Behavioral History is unconventional, provocative, and compelling. This collection gives new vigor to the study of social history.”
-Joan Jacobs Brumberg,author of The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls
Review
“Peter Stearns and his intrepid co-conspirators do not, like other seekers of truth in history, try to understand the past in its own terms. Instead, they try to learn from the past to touch the present and affect the future. One after another, their extraordinary essays suggest that their audacious ambition may be attainable.”
-Michael Zuckerman,author of Almost Chosen People: Oblique Biographies in the American Grain
Review
“Stearns and his colleagues leave us with a compelling sense that we need history to understand ourselves. Without an engaged historical perspective on today's behaviors, prescriptions for social change will not only fail, but leave us vulnerable to quick fixes and moral zealotry, sparking social behaviors—;incidentally, with a rich American past—;whose history might assist us in our efforts to understand today's cultural and political climate, and, perhaps, begin to change it.”
-Journal of American History,
Synopsis
From his founding of
The Journal of Social History to his groundbreaking work on the history of emotions, weight, and parenting, Peter N. Stearns has pushed the boundaries of social history to new levels, presenting new insights into how people have lived and thought through the ages. Having established the history of emotions as a major subfield of social history, Stearns and his collaborators are poised to do the same thing with the study of human behavior. This is their manifesto.
American Behavioral History deals with specific uses of historical data and analysis to illuminate American behavior patterns, ranging from car buying rituals to sexuality, and from funeral practices to contemporary grandparenting. The anthology illustrates the advantages and parameters of analyzing the ways in which people behave, and adds significantly to our social understanding while developing innovative methods for historical teaching and research.
At its core, the collection demonstrates how the study of the past can be directly used to understand current behaviors in the United States. Throughout, contributors discuss not only specific behavioral patterns but, importantly, how to consider and interpret them as vital historical sources.
Contributors include Gary Cross, Paula Fass, Linda Rosenzweig, Susan Matt, Steven M. Gelber, Peter N. Stearns, Suzanne Smith, Mark M. Smith, Kevin White.
Synopsis
The Making of Martin Luther King and The Civil Rights Movement incorporates the changing focus of civil rights movement studies to focus on communities and leaders heretofore ignored or under-represented, and thereby challenges many of the agendas established by civil rights scholarship of the past twenty-five years. We learn from essays on communities in Louisiana, Arkansas, and Montgomery that key centers of black life, such as unions, schools, teachers, businessmen, and masonic lodges played important roles in the movement. We learn of the importance of influential local leaders such as W. H. Flowers in Arkansas and Edgar Daniel Nixon in Montgomery, who were tremendously effective at organizing on the local level.The volume also confronts paradigms of history such as the notion that the Civil Rights Movement can be traced from the reformist integration of King, to the revolutionary black nationalism of Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael, and the Black Panther Party. Clayborne Carson argues in a pathbreaking essay that there were radical undercurrents in mass black movements of the 1950s and early 60s, and that these undercurrents contained the seeds of the most significant mass movements of subsequent decades. In contrast, black power militancy of the late 1960's, according to Carson, was either readily suppressed or transformed into forms that did not threaten the dominant political and economic elites.
About the Author
Peter N. Stearns is Provost and Professor of History at George Mason University. His publications include The Encyclopedia of World History; Western Civilizations in World History; World Civilizations, Volume II: 1450 to the Present; and World History in Brief: Major Patterns of Change and Continuity.