Synopses & Reviews
MAKING AMERICA: A HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES, BRIEF FIFTH EDITION, presents history as a dynamic process shaped by human expectations, difficult choices, and often the surprising consequences. With this focus on history as a process, MAKING AMERICA encourages users to think historically and to develop into citizens who value the past. The clear chronology, straightforward narrative, and strong thematic structure emphasize communication over intimidation, and appeal to users of varied learning levels.
Review
"I like the style of the Berkin text, especially compared to other texts I have used and read. It is accessible to students and is written in a fashion that students enjoy."
Review
"Berkin is very readable, very well-written--students love it."
Synopsis
With an accessible reading style abundant pedagogy, and reasonable price tag, MAKING AMERICA, BRIEF, is the perfect choice for inexperienced students and cost-conscious professors. The Second Edition features chapter-opening maps, timelines, and chronology charts that emphasize key developments, enhance geographical awareness, and highlight political events.
Synopsis
With an accessible reading style, abundant pedagogy, and reasonable price tag, Making America, Brief, is the perfect choice for inexperienced students and cost-conscious professors.
The Second Edition features chapter-opening maps, timelines, and chronology charts that emphasize key developments, enhance geographical awareness, and highlight political events.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. A1-A12) and index.
About the Author
Born in Mobile, Alabama, Carol Berkin received her undergraduate degree from Barnard College and her Ph.D. from Columbia University. Her dissertation won the Bancroft Award. She is now presidential professor of history at Baruch College and the Graduate Center of City University of New York. She has written JONATHAN SEWALL: ODYSSEY OF AN AMERICAN LOYALIST (1974); FIRST GENERATIONS: WOMEN IN COLONIAL AMERICA (l996); A BRILLIANT SOLUTION: INVENTING THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTION (2002); and REVOLUTIONARY MOTHERS: WOMEN IN THE STRUGGLE FOR AMERICA?S INDEPENDENCE (2005). She has edited WOMEN OF AMERICA: A HISTORY (with Mary Beth Norton, 1979); WOMEN, WAR AND REVOLUTION (with Clara M. Lovett, 1980); WOMEN?S VOICES, WOMEN?S LIVES: DOCUMENTS IN EARLY AMERICAN HISTORY (with Leslie Horowitz, 1998); and LOOKING FORWARD/LOOKING BACK: A WOMEN?S STUDIES READER (with Judith Pinch and Carole Appel, 2005). She was contributing editor on southern women for THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SOUTHERN CULTURE and has appeared in the PBS series ?Liberty! The American Revolution; Ben Franklin; and Alexander Hamilton? and The History Channel?s ?Founding Fathers.? Professor Berkin chaired the Dunning Beveridge Prize Committee for the American Historical Association, the Columbia University Seminar in Early American History, and the Taylor Prize Committee of the Southern Association of Women Historians. She served on the program committees for both the Society for the History of the Early American Republic and the Organization of American Historians. She has served on the Planning Committee for the U.S. Department of Education?s National Assessment of Educational Progress, and she chaired the CLEP Committee for Educational Testing Service. She serves on the Board of Trustees of The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and The National Council for History Education.Born and raised in Portland, Oregon, Christopher L. Miller received his Bachelor of Science degree from Lewis and Clark College and his Ph.D. from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is currently associate professor of history at the University of Texas?Pan American. He is the author of PROPHETIC WORLDS: INDIANS AND WHITES ON THE COLUMBIA PLATEAU (1985), which in 2003 was republished as part of the ?Columbia Northwest Classics Series? by the University of Washington Press. His articles and reviews have appeared in numerous scholarly journals and anthologies as well as standard reference works. Dr. Miller is also active in contemporary Indian affairs. He served, for example, as a participant in the American Indian Civics Project funded by the Kellogg Foundation. He has been a research fellow at the Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History at Harvard University and was the Nikolay V. Sivachev Distinguished Chair in American History at Lomonosov Moscow State University (Russia). Professor Miller has also been active in projects designed to improve history teaching, including programs funded by the Meadows Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education, and other agencies.Born in Marysville, Kansas, and raised in Beatrice, Nebraska, Robert W. Cherny received his B.A. from the University of Nebraska and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia University. He is professor of history at San Francisco State University. His books include COMPETING VISIONS: A HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA (with Richard Griswold del Castillo, 2005); AMERICAN POLITICS IN THE GILDED AGE, 1868?1900 (1997); SAN FRANCISCO, 1865?1932: POLITICS, POWER, AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT (with William Issel, 1986); A RIGHTEOUS CAUSE: THE LIFE OF WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN (1985, 1994); and POPULISM, PROGRESSIVISM, AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF NEBRASKA POLITICS, 1885?1915 (1981). He is co-editor of AMERICAN LABOR AND THE COLD WAR: UNIONS, POLITICS, AND POSTWAR POLITICAL CULTURE (with William Issel and Keiran Taylor, 2004). His articles on politics and labor in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries have appeared in journals, anthologies, and historical dictionaries and encyclopedias. In 2000, he and Ellen Du Bois co-edited a special issue of the ?Pacific Historical Review? that surveyed women?s suffrage movements in nine locations around the Pacific Rim. He has been an NEH Fellow, Distinguished Fulbright Lecturer at Lomonosov Moscow State University (Russia), and Visiting Research Scholar at the University of Melbourne (Australia). He has served as president of H-Net (an association of more than 100 electronic networks for scholars in the humanities and social sciences), the Society for Historians of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, and of the Southwest Labor Studies Association; as treasurer of the Organization of American Historians; and as a member of the council of the American Historical Association, Pacific Coast Branch.Born in Riverside, California, James L. Gormly received a B.A. from the University of Arizona and his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Connecticut. He is now professor of history and chair of the history department at Washington and Jefferson College. He has written THE COLLAPSE OF THE GRAND ALLIANCE (1970) and FROM POTSDAM TO THE COLD WAR (1979). His articles and reviews have appeared in ?Diplomatic History,? ?The Journal of American History,? ?The American Historical Review,? ?The Historian,? ?The History Teacher,? and ?The Journal of Interdisciplinary History.?Born and raised in Phoenix, Arizona, Douglas R. Egerton received his undergraduate degree from Arizona State University and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Georgetown University. He is professor of history at Le Moyne College. His books include YEAR OF METEORS: THE ELECTION OF 1860 AND THE SECESSION WINTER (2010); DEATH OR LIBERTY: AFRICAN AMERICANS AND REVOLUTIONARY AMERICA (2009); THE ATLANTIC WORLD: A HISTORY, 1400-1888 (with Alison Games, Kris Lane, and Donald R. Wright, 2007); REBELS, REFORMERS and AND REVOLUTIONARIES: COLLECTED ESSAYS AND SECOND THOUGHTS (2002); HE SHALL GO OUT FREE: THE LIVES OF DENMARK VESEY (1999); GABRIEL'S REBELLION: THE VIRGINIA SLAVE CONSPIRACIES OF 1800 and 1802 (1993); and CHARLES FENTON MERCER AND THE TRIAL OF NATIONAL CONSERVATISM (1989). He was script consultant and on-camera commentator for two PBS series, "Africans in America" (1998) and "This Far By Faith: Stories of African American Religion" (2003). His articles on race and politics in early America have appeared in journals, anthologies, and encyclopedias. Professor Egerton served on the dissertation prize committee for the Southern Historical Association, and the book and article prize committees for the Society of Historians of the Early Republic. He has served on the editorial boards of the "Journal of the Early Republic" and "The Historian," and he was awarded the John Adams Chair (Netherlands) Fulbright Scholar Distinguished Lecturing Award.
Table of Contents
Note: Each chapter concludes with Suggested Readings. 1. Making a "New" World, to 1588 American Origins European Outreach and the Age of Exploration The Challenges of Mutual Discovery 2. A Continent on the Move, 1400-1725 The New Europe and the Atlantic World Individual Choices: Cabeza de Vaca European Empires in America Indians and the European Challenge Conquest and Accommodation in a Shared New World 3. Founding the English Mainland Colonies, 1607-1732 England and Colonization Settling the Chesapeake New England: Colonies of Dissenters The Pluralism of the Middle Colonies The Colonies of the Lower South 4. The British Colonies in the Eighteenth Century, 1689-1763 The British Transatlantic Communities of Trade Community and Work in Colonial Society Individual Choices: James Revel Reason and Religion in Colonial Society Government and Politics in the Mainland Colonies North America and the Struggle for Empire 5. Choosing Loyalties, 1763-1776 Victory's New Problems Asserting American Rights The Crisis Renewed The Decision for Independence Individual Choices: Esther Quincy Sewall 6. Re-creating America: Independence and a New Nation, 1775-1783 The First Two Years of War Influences away from the Battlefield From Stalemate to Victory Republican Expectations in the New Nation Making History: A Revolution in Women's Education 7. Competing Visions of the Virtuous Republic, 1776-1800 What Kind of a Republic? Challenges to the Confederation Creating a New Government Resolving the Conflict of Visions Competing Visions Reemerge Conflict in the Adams Administration Making History: Restraining Federal Power 8. The Triumphs and Trials of Jeffersonianism, 1800-1815 The "Revolution of 1800" Republicanism in Action Challenge and Uncertainty in Jefferson's America Troubling Currents in Jefferson's America Crises in the Nation The Nation at War The War's Strange Conclusion Individual Choices: William Weatherford 9. The Rise of a New Nation, 1815-1836 The Emergence of New Expectations Politics and Diplomacy in an Era of Good Feelings Dynamic Growth and Political Consequences The "New Man" in Politics The Presidency of Andrew Jackson Individual Choices: Samuel Austin Worcester 10. The Great Transformation, 1815-1840 The Transportation Revolution The Manufacturing Boom The New Cotton Empire in the South 11. Responses to the Great Transformation, 1815-1840 Reactions to Changing Conditions Toward an American Culture The Whig Alternative to Jacksonian Democracy Making History: Prescribing Middle-Class Expectations 12. Westward Expansion and Manifest Destiny, 1841-1849 The Explosion Westward The Social Fabric in the West The Triumph of "Manifest Destiny" Individual Choices: Lorenzo de Zavala Expansion and Sectional Crisis 13. Sectional Conflict and Shattered Union, 1850-1861 New Political Choices Toward a House Divided Individual Choices: Harriet Tubman The Divided Nation The Nation Dissolved 14. A Violent Solution: Civil War, 1861-1865 The Politics of War From Bull Run to Antietam The Human Dimensions of War Waging Total War Making History: The Choice for Emancipation 15. Reconstruction: High Hopes and Broken Dreams, 1865-1877 Presidential Reconstruction Freedom and the Legacy of Slavery Congressional Reconstruction Black Reconstruction The End of Reconstruction 16. Survival of the Fittest: Entrepreneurs and Workers in Industrial America, 1865-1900 Foundation for Industrialization Railroads and Economic Growth Entrepreneurs and Industrial Transformation Workers in Industrial America The Varieties of Labor Organization and Action Individual Choices: Mother Jones The Nation Transformed 17. Conflict and Change in the West, 1865-1902 War for the West Mormons, Cowboys, and Sodbusters: The Transformation of the West, Part I Individual Choices: Sitting Bull Railroads, Mining, Agribusinesses, Logging, and Finance: The Transformation of the West, Part II Ethnicity and Race in the West The West in American Thought 18. The New Social Patterns of Urban and Industrial America, 1865-1917 The New Urban Environment Poverty and the City New Americans from Europe New South, Old Issues New Patterns of American Social and Cultural Life Making History: New Choices for Women 19. Political Stalemate and Political Upheaval, 1868-1900 Parties, Voters, and Reformers Political Stalemate Agricultural Distress and Political Upheaval Economic Collapse and Political Upheaval Individual Choices: Grover Cleveland 20. Becoming a World Power: America and World Affairs, 1865-1913 The United States and World Affairs, 1865-1889 Stepping Cautiously in World Affairs, 1889-1897 Striding Boldly: War and Imperialism, 1897-1901 "Carry a Big Stick": The United States and World Affairs, 1901-1913 21. The Progressive Era, 1900-1917 Individual Choices: W.E.B. DuBois The Reform of Politics, the Politics of Reform Roosevelt, Taft, and Republican Progressivism Wilson and Democratic Progressivism Progressivism in Perspective 22. America and the World, 1913-1920 Inherited Commitments and New Directions From Neutrality to War: 1914-1917 The Home Front Americans "Over There" Wilson and the Peace Conference Trauma in the Wake of War Making History: The Choice to Declare War 23. The 1920s, 1920-1928 Prosperity Decade The "Roaring Twenties" Individual Choices: Langston Hughes Race, Class, and Gender in the 1920s The Politics of Prosperity 24. From Good Times to Hard Times, 1920-1932 The Diplomacy of Prosperity The Failure of Prosperity Government and Economic Crisis Individual Choices: Milo Reno Depression America 25. The New Deal, 1933-1940 A New President, a New Deal The Second Hundred Days The New Deal and Society Individual Choices: Frances Perkins The New Deal Winds Down 26. America's Rise to World Leadership, 1933-1945 Roosevelt and Foreign Policy The Road to War America Responds to War Waging World War Making History: The Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb 27. Truman and Cold War America, 1945-1952 The Cold War Begins The Korean War Homecomings and Adjustments Cold War Politics Individual Choices: Paul Robeson 28. Quest for Consensus, 1952-1960 The Best of Times Individual Choices: Allen Ginsberg Politics of Consensus Seeking Civil Rights Eisenhower and a Hostile World 29. Great Promises, Bitter Disappointments, 1960-1968 Kennedy and the New Frontier Flexible Response Beyond the New Frontier New Agendas Making History: The Debate over Black Power 30. America Under Stress, 1963-1975 Johnson and the World Expanding the American Dream Nixon and the Balance of Power Nixon and Politics 31. Facing Limits, 1974-1992 Politics of Uncertainty Carter's Foreign Policy Enter Ronald Reagan--Stage Right Individual Choices: Bill Gates Asserting World Power In Reagan's Shadow 32. Making New Choices, 1992-1999 An Anxious Society Grows More Confident The Politics of Morality Calls for Change Appendices Bibliography Documents: Declaration of Independence; Constitution of the United States Tables: Territorial Expansion of the United States; Admission of States into the Union; Presidential Elections Index