Synopses & Reviews
Known for its clear narrative voice and impeccable scholarship, Alan Brinkley's best-selling survey text invites students to think critically about the many forces that continually create the Unfinished Nation that is the United States. In a concise but wide-ranging narrative, Brinkley shows the diversity and complexity of the nation and our understanding of its history--one that continues to evolve both in the events of the present and in our reexamination of new evidence and perspectives on the past. This sixth edition features a new series of Patterns of Popular Culture essays, as well as expanded coverage of pre-Columbian America, new America in the World essays, and updated coverage of recent events and developments that demonstrates how a new generation continues to shape the American story.
About the Author
ALAN BRINKLEY is the Allan Nevins Professor of History and former Provost at Columbia University. He is the author of Voices of Protest: Huey Long, Father Coughlin, and the Great Depression, which won the 1983 National Book Award; The End of Reform: New Deal Liberalism in Recession and War; and Liberalism and its Discontents. His most recent books -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt and The Publisher: Henry Luce and His American Century will be published in 2010. He was educated at Princeton and Harvard. He taught previously at MIT, Harvard, and the City University Graduate School before joining the Columbia faculty In 1991. In 1998-1999, he was the Harmsworth Professor of American History at Oxford University. He won the Joseph R. Levenson Memorial Teaching Award at Harvard in 1987 and the Great Teacher Award at Columbia in 2003. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the board of trustees of the National Humanities Center and Oxford University Press, and chairman of the board of trustees of the Century Foundation. He has been a visiting professor at Princeton, the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (Paris), and the University of Torino (Italy). He was the 1998-1999 Harmsworth Professor of American History at Oxford University.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: The Meeting of Cultures
America Before Columbus
Europe Looks Westward
The Arrival of the English
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The American Population Before Columbus
America in the World: The Atlantic Context of Early American History
America in the World: Mercantilism and Colonial Commerce
Chapter 2: Transplantations and Borderlands
The Early Chesapeake
The Growth of New England
The Restoration Colonies
Borderlands and Middle Grounds
The Development of Empire
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: Native Americans and "The Middle Ground"
Chapter 3: Society and Culture in Provincial America
The Colonial Population
The Colonial Economies
Patterns of Society
Awakenings and Enlightenments
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Origins of Slavery
Debating the Past: The Witchcraft Trials
Chapter 4: The Empire in Transition
Loosening Ties
The Struggle for the Continent
The New Imperialism
Stirrings of Revolt
Cooperation and War
Conclusion
For Further Reference
America in the World: The First Global War
Patterns of Popular Culture: Taverns in Revolutionary Massachusetts
Chapter 5: The American Revolution
The States United
The War for Independence
War and Society
The Creation of State Governments
The Search for a National Government
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The American Revolution
America in the World: The Age of Revolutions
Chapter 6: The Constitution and the New Republic
Framing a New Government
Adoption and Adaptation
Federalists and Republicans
Establishing National Sovereignty
The Downfall of the Federalists
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Background of the Constitution
Chapter 7: The Jeffersonian Era
The Rise of Cultural Nationalism
Stirrings of Industrialism
Jefferson the President
Doubling the National Domain
Expansion and War
The War of 1812
Conclusion
For Further Reference
America in the World: The Global Industrial Revolution
Patterns of Popular Culture: Horse Racing
Chapter 8: Varieties of American Nationalism
Stabilizing Economic Growth
Expanding Westward
The "Era of Good Feelings"
Sectionalism and Nationalism
The Revival of Opposition
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Chapter 9: Jacksonian America
The Rise of Mass Politics
"Our Federal Union"
The Removal of the Indians
Jackson and the Bank War
The Emergence of the Second Party System
Politics After Jackson
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: Jacksonian Democracy
Patterns of Popular Culture: The Penny Press
Chapter 10: America's Economic Revolution
The Changing American Population
Transportation and Communications Revolutions
Commerce and Industry
Men and Women at Work
Patterns of Society
The Agricultural North
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Patterns of Popular Culture: Shakespeare in America
Chapter 11: Cotton, Slavery, and the Old South
The Cotton Economy
Southern White Society
The "Peculiar Institution"
The Culture of Slavery
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Character of Slavery
Chapter 12: Antebellum Culture and Reform
The Romantic Impulse
Remaking Society
The Crusade Against Slavery
Conclusion
For Further Reference
America in the World: The Abolition of Slavery
Chapter 13: The Impending Crisis
Looking Westward
Expansion and War
The Sectional Debate
The Crisis of the 1850s
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Chapter 14: The Civil War
The Secession Crisis
The Mobilization of the North
The Mobilization of the South
Strategy and Diplomacy
Campaigns and Battles
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Causes of the Civil War
Patterns of Popular Culture: Baseball and the Civil War
Chapter 15: Reconstruction and the New South
The Problems of Peacemaking
Radical Reconstruction
The South in Reconstruction
The Grant Administration
The Abandonment of Reconstruction
The New South
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: Reconstruction
Chapter 16: The Conquest of the Far West
The Societies of the Far West
The Changing Western Economy
The Romance of the West
The Dispersal of the Tribes
The Rise and Decline of the Western Farmer
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Frontier and the West
Chapter 17: Industrial Supremacy
Sources of Industrial Growth
Capitalism and Its Critics
The Ordeal of the Worker
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Patterns of Popular Culture: The Novels of Horatio Alger
Chapter 18: The Age of the City
The New Urban Growth
The Urban Landscape
Strains of Urban Life
The Rise of Mass Consumption
Leisure in the Consumer Society
High Culture in the Urban Age
Conclusion
For Further Reference
America in the World: Global Migrations
Chapter 19: From Crisis to Empire
The Politics of Equilibrium
The Agrarian Revolt
The Crisis of the 1890s
Stirrings of Imperialism
War with Spain
The Republic as Empire
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: Populism
America in the World: Imperialism
Chapter 20: The Progressives
The Progressive Impulse
Women and Reform
The Assault on the Parties
Sources of Progressive Reform
Crusades for Order and Reform
Theodore Roosevelt and the Modern Presidency
The Troubled Succession
Woodrow Wilson and the New Freedom
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: Progressivism
American in the World: Social Democracy
Chapter 21: America and the Great War
The "Big Stick": America and the World, 1901-1917
The Road to War
"War Without Stint"
The Search for a New World Order
A Society in Turmoil
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Patterns of Popular Culture: Billy Sunday and Modern Revivalism
Chapter 22: The New Era
The New Economy
The New Culture
A Conflict of Cultures
Republican Government
Conclusion
For Further Reference
America in the World: The Cinema
Chapter 23: The Great Depression
The Coming of the Depression
The American People in Hard Times
The Depression and American Culture
The Ordeal of Herbert Hoover
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: Causes of the Great Depression
America in the World: The Global Depression
Chapter 24: The New Deal
Launching the New Deal
The New Deal in Transition
The New Deal in Disarray
Limits and Legacies of the New Deal
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The New Deal
Patterns of Popular Culture: The Golden Age of Comic Books
Chapter 25: The Global Crisis, 1921-1941
The Diplomacy of the New Era
Isolationism and Internationalism
From Neutrality to Intervention
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Question of Pearl Harbor
America in the World: The Sino-Japanese War, 1931-1941
Chapter 26: America in a World at War
War on Two Fronts
The American Economy in Wartime
Race and Gender in Wartime America
Anxiety and Affluence in Wartime Culture
The Defeat of the Axis
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb
Chapter 27: The Cold War
Origins of the Cold War
The Collapse of the Peace
America After the War
The Korean War
The Crusade Against Subversion
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Cold War
Debating the Past: McCarthyism
Chapter 28: The Affluent Society
The Economic "Miracle"
The Explosion of Science and Technology
People of Plenty
The Other America
The Rise of the Civil Rights Movement
Eisenhower Republicanism
Eisenhower, Dulles, and the Cold War
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Patterns of Popular Culture: Lucy and Desi
Chapter 29: The Ordeal of Liberalism
Expanding the Liberal State
The Battle for Racial Equality
"Flexible Response" and the Cold War
The Agony of Vietnam
The Traumas of 1968
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: The Civil Rights Movement
Debating the Past: The Vietnam Commitment
America in the World: 1968
Chapter 30: The Crisis of Authority
Youth Culture
The Mobilization of Minorities
The New Feminism
Environmentalism in a Turbulent Society
Nixon, Kissinger, and the War
Nixon, Kissinger, and the World
Politics and Economics in the Nixon Years
The Watergate Crisis
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Debating the Past: Watergate
America in the World: The End of Colonialism
Chapter 31: From the "Age of Limits" to the Age of Reagan
Politics and Diplomacy After Watergate
The Rise of the New American Right
The "Reagan Revolution"
America and the Waning of the Cold War
Conclusion
For Further Reference
Patterns of Popular Culture: The Mall
Chapter 32: The Age of Globalization
The Resurgence of Partisanship
The Economic Boom
Science and Technology in the New Economy
A Changing Society
A Contested Culture
The Perils of Globalization
Conclusion
For Further Reference
America in the World: The Global Environmental Movement