Synopses & Reviews
The Brief Edition of A PEOPLE AND A NATION offers a succinct and spirited narrative that tells the stories of all people in the United States. The authors' attention to race and racial identity and their inclusion of everyday people and popular culture brings history to life, engaging readers and encouraging them to imagine what life was really like in the past.
About the Author
Mary Beth Norton, the Mary Donlon Alger Professor of American History at Cornell University, received her B.A. from the University of Michigan and her Ph.D. from Harvard University. Her many books have won prizes from the Society of American Historians, Berkshire Conference of Women Historians, and English-Speaking Union. Her book, FOUNDING MOTHERS and FATHERS (1996), was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. In 2011 her book SEPARATED BY THEIR SEX: WOMEN IN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE IN THE COLONIAL ATLANTIC WORLD was published. She was Pitt Professor of American History at the University of Cambridge in 2005-2006. The Rockefeller Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, and Huntington Library, among others, have awarded her fellowships. Professor Norton has served on the National Council for the Humanities and is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She teaches courses in the history of exploration, early America, women's history, Atlantic world, and American Revolution. Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in Bethesda, Maryland, Carol Sheriff received her B.A. from Wesleyan University (1985) and her Ph.D. from Yale University (1993). Since 1993, she has taught history at the College of William and Mary, where she has won the Thomas Jefferson Teaching Award, the Alumni Teaching Fellowship Award, and the University Professorship for Teaching Excellence. Her publications include THE ARTIFICIAL RIVER: THE ERIE CANAL AND THE PARADOX OF PROGRESS (1996), which won the Dixon Ryan Fox Award from the New York State Historical Association and the Award for Excellence in Research from the New York State Archives, and A PEOPLE AT WAR: CIVILIANS AND SOLDIERS IN AMERICA'S CIVIL WAR, 1854-1877 (with Scott Reynolds Nelson, 2007). Carol has written sections of a teaching manual for the New York State history curriculum, given presentations at Teaching American History grant projects, consulted on an exhibit for the Rochester Museum and Science Center, appeared in the History Channel's Modern Marvels show on the Erie Canal, and is engaged in several public history projects marking the sesquicentennial of the Civil War. At William and Mary, she teaches the U.S. history survey as well as upper-level classes on the Early Republic, the Civil War Era, and the American West. Born in Flint, Michigan, David W. Blight received his B.A. from Michigan State University (1971) and his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin (1985). He is now Class of 1954 Professor of American History and director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale University. For the first seven years of his career, David was a public high school teacher in Flint. He has written FREDERICK DOUGLASS'S CIVIL WAR (1989) and RACE AND REUNION: THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICAN MEMORY, 1863-1915 (2001), which received eight awards, including the Bancroft Prize, the Frederick Douglass Prize, and the Abraham Lincoln Prize, as well as four prizes awarded by the Organization of American Historians. His most recent book is A SLAVE NO MORE: THE EMANCIPATION OF JOHN WASHINGTON AND WALLACE TURNAGE (2007), which won three prizes. He has edited or co-edited six other books, including editions of W.E.B. DuBois's THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLK, and NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. David's essays have appeared in the JOURNAL OF AMERICAN HISTORY, CIVIL WAR HISTORY, and WHY THE CIVIL WAR CAME (Gabor Boritt, ed., 1996), among others. In 1992-1993 he was senior Fulbright Professor in American Studies at the University of Munich, Germany, and in 2006-2007 he held a fellowship at the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, New York Public Library. A consultant to several documentary films, David appeared in the 1998 PBS series, Africans in America. He has served on the Council of the American Historical Association. David also teaches summer seminars for secondary school teachers, as well as for park rangers and historians of the National Park Service. Howard P. Chudacoff, the George L. Littlefield Professor of American History and Professor of Urban Studies at Brown University, was born in Omaha, Nebraska. He earned his A.B. (1965) and Ph.D. (1969) from the University of Chicago. He has written MOBILE AMERICANS (1972), HOW OLD ARE YOU (1989), THE AGE OF THE BACHELOR (1999), THE EVOLUTION OF AMERICAN URBAN SOCIETY (with Judith Smith, 2004), and CHILDREN AT PLAY: AN AMERICAN HISTORY (2007). He has also co-edited, with Peter Baldwin, MAJOR PROBLEMS IN AMERICAN URBAN HISTORY (2004). His articles have appeared in such journals as the JOURNAL OF FAMILY HISTORY, REVIEWS IN AMERICAN HISTORY, and JOURNAL OF AMERICAN HISTORY. At Brown University, Howard has co-chaired the American Civilization Program, chaired the Department of History, and serves as Brown's faculty representative to the NCAA. He has also served on the board of directors of the Urban History Association. The National Endowment for the Humanities, Ford Foundation, and Rockefeller Foundation have given him awards to advance his scholarship. A native of Stockholm, Sweden, Fredrik Logevall is John S. Knight Professor of International Studies and Professor of History at Cornell University, where he serves as director of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies. He received his B.A. from Simon Fraser University (1986) and his Ph.D. from Yale University (1993). His most recent book is AMERICA'S COLD WAR: THE POLITICS OF INSECURITY (with Campbell Craig, 2009). His other publications include CHOOSING WAR (1999), which won three prizes, including the Warren F. Kuehl Book Prize from the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR); THE ORIGINS OF THE VIETNAM WAR (2001); TERRORISM AND 9/11: A READER (2002); as co-editor, the ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY (2002); and, as co-editor, THE FIRST VIETNAM WAR: COLONIAL CONFLICT AND COLD WAR CRISIS (2007). Fred is a past recipient of the Stuart L. Bernath article, book, and lecture prizes from SHAFR and is a member of the SHAFR Council, the Cornell University Press faculty board, and the editorial advisory board of the Presidential Recordings Project at the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia. In 2006-2007 he was Leverhulme Visiting Professor at the University of Nottingham and Mellon Senior Fellow at the University of Cambridge.
Table of Contents
1. Three Old Worlds Create a New, 1492-1600. 2. Europeans Colonize North America, 1600-1650. 3. North America in the Atlantic World, 1650-1720. 4. American Society Transformed, 1720-1770. 5. Severing the Bonds of Empire, 1754-1774. 6. A Revolution, Indeed, 1774-1783. 7. Forging a National Republic, 1776-1789. 8. The Early Republic: Conflicts at Home and Abroad, 1789-1800. 9. Defining the Nation, 1801-1823. 10. The Rise of the South, 1815-1860. 11. The Restless North, 1815-1860. 12. Reform and Politics, 1824-1845. 13. The Contested West, 1815-1860. 14. Slavery and America's Future: The Road to War, 1845-1861. 15. Transforming Fire: The Civil War, 1861-1865. 16. Reconstruction: An Unfinished Revolution, 1865-1877.