Students will be required to read and evaluate the cultural and social factors of each monograph. Additionally students will assess the historiographical progression of cultural studies in American History. Considering the cultural history of each monograph will assist students in identifying themes that contributed to cultural changes in America’s past. (Needs one more sentence)
Reading List Bibliography:
Ayers, Edward L. The Promise of the New South: Life After Reconstruction (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992)
Hodgson, Godfrey, America in Our Time: From World War II to Nixon - What Happened and Why. Princeton University Press, 1976.
Jensen, Merrill. The Articles of Confederation: An Interpretation of the Social-Constitutional History
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The use of the monographs will offer students with an insight on several American eras that faced significant changes in the nation’s society. The importance of learning cultural history with the reading of the monographs allows students to consider how the identity of American society evolved over the nation’s history. The narratives stress the function that American history courses have in education. Functioning as a method to explain the modern world, the course’s monographs will seek develop this concept by highlighting themes of cultural history. Ascertaining the themes of cultural history allows students to analyze the monographs critically. Analyzing the histories will enable students to understand how events altered lives of women, African Americans, and minority groups in American …show more content…
The book will challenge students to understand how Reconstruction changed the lives and society of both the common white and African-Americans in the South. Lastly, the monograph supports the class’ philosophy of cultural history as it examines African-Americans in the Southern states. Students will use their knowledge of cultural history to analyze the conflicts and violence that rose between both white and African-Americans living in the South. The final two monographs were chosen for the course as the display the changes in American society amongst women, African-Americans, and other marginal groups. Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era and America Divided: The Civil War of the 1960’s will task students in evaluating the changes in the American in Post-World War II America. Homeward Bound evaluates the American “nuclear family” during the 1950s. The book will allow students to evaluate how Post-War and Early Cold War America influenced themes like gender and societal roles. Additionally, the book will allow students to identify how the Atomic Era influenced the cultural history of the United States. The final book on the reading list continues where Homeward Bound left off. America in Our Time: From World War II to Nixon - What Happened and
In the preface of Lawrence Levine’s Black Culture and Black Consciousness, he establishes two endeavors that his text was intended to accomplish. The first of these was to accurately analyze the history of the general African American population from the antebellum period to the 1940’s. It was Levine’s hope to “write a history of thought of a people who have been too largely neglected and too consistently misunderstood”(xxvii). It was his goal to give a perspective on the history of African Americans that was closer to the truth than those that are most often portrayed by historians. Lawrence Levine also introduces in his preface the idea that historians are often limited by their bias towards sources that are easily acquired and have been
Stephanie McCurry, in her revolutionary book Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South, claims that her book is about “politics and the power in the Civil War South, about the bloody trial of the Confederacy’s national vision, and about the significance of the disfranchised in it.” Choosing to examine both yeoman/poor white women and enslaved African Americans in the Confederacy, McCurry’s book distances itself from the historiography focused on answering the question of “why the Confederacy lost the Civil War.” Instead, McCurry focuses more exclusively on the effects of the Civil War and how war changed both the United States and the world, most notably in Cuba and Brazil. Conjecturing as her primary thesis, McCurry argues that “the power that counts in politics, is often exercised brutally, and almost always wins, but that once in a long while – as in the Civil War South – history opens up, resistance prevails, and the usually powerless manage against all imaginable odds to change the
For this purpose, a special convention was held in Philadelphia for delegates to “overhaul” the Articles of Confederation and “render the constitution of the Federal government adequate to the exigencies of the union” (161). During what came to be known as the Constitutional Convention, many issues were debated and
The industrialization of America had a monumental impact on the citizens. With change comes the upsides and the downsides, so there were critiques such as Henry George and Edward Bellamy. Also this was a time of change for woman, questions regarding ‘place’, purpose, and morality were too brought to light.
In chapter 16th “Reconstruction,” the author gives a comprehensible perspective of the historical era that made a major difference in America today. Many northerners populated the main question of how to restructure the nation as one which led to numerous complicated questions as to how, what, whom and under what circumstances would America readmit the union. In the chapter, the author introduces a variety of changes such as presidential, congressional reconstruction and most importantly the old south. Along with discontinued slavery and established constitutional amendments. Rebuilding the south economically and politically was just as difficult as on the battlefield, extremely long and very complex.
The primarily focus of this paper is to address the studies of the African-American views, conflict, and treatments from the Southern states following The Civil War. Documents include “Black Codes of the State of Mississippi” and the “Address of the Colored Convention to the People of Alabama”. These documents provide shaped rules, laws, and statutes for black society among whites. Between the years of, 1865 and 1867, both Alabama and Mississippi took action and state their thoughts towards the end of slavery in the United States.
"America 's Reconstruction: People and Politics After the Civil War. " America 's Reconstruction: People and Politics After the Civil War. Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, 2003. Web.
In this essay, it says that Samuel Eliot Morison wrote about how important learning history is, “So, too, we ought to read history because it breaks down dividers between the disciplines of science, medicine, philosophy, art, and music, which is all part of the human story.” I find it truly fascinating how much one can learn all from studying history. This point could go along with the culture and society theme. In each subject that goes along with history, there are different cultures that make its background. Since they all go into history, this shows that history is full of different cultures and
The Articles of Confederation did not adequately control and decrease the negative impacts of groups on the country, and in this manner another government was essential. The administration laid out in the Constitution was perfect since it was a republic, an agent government that would keep self-intrigued interests from holding an excessive amount of influence over the legislature. It was equally substantial, containing agents from each state and various vested parties, making it troublesome for one faction to overwhelm and stifle the others. Delegates would be chosen by a large group of individuals, assuring that just the most commendable would hold office. At last, laws were gone by the entire country, making it troublesome for issues in one state to invade and influence others.
The Articles of Confederation were a document seen as the “first” constitution of the United States. This document granted the new national government power to control the military, declare war, and create treaties between the states. However, the Articles had holes in it considering the government did not have the power to tax, create laws without at least nine states’ approval, or change the Articles of Confederation without a unanimous vote. This means that the country soon fell into debt and petty arguments between state, the new government had no control. It was time for a change.
Slavery, the War on Black Family While slavery in America was an institution that was started over 400 years ago, the affects were so horrific that it is still felt today by modern day African Americans. Many families had to deal with the constant stress of being sold which made it difficult to have a normal family life. Slaves were sold to pay off debts, an owner dying and his slaves were sold in an estate sale, or when an owner’s children would leave the home to begin a life of their own, they would take slaves with them. Often times, children were not raised by their parents, other family members of someone designated to watch the children because the mother and father had to work long hours and the children were too young to join them.
America experienced a sudden disregard of Victorian values following World War I, causing the generation of the 1920s to dramatically contrast the previous. This severe degree of change produced three major manifestations of the contradictions in the twenties. There were massive conflicts to the Jazz Age, technological advancements, and Black Migration. The contradictions of the 1920s reflect America’s conflicted state between advancement and convention, as the cultural and technological developments of the era coincide with the inability of individuals to stray from traditional norms and racist attitudes.
Eric Foner’s A Short History of Reconstruction, is an abridged version of the multiple award-winning Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution (1988), offers a summary of some of the most influential pieces of history with his arguments regarding themes, such as the way South was changed amid and after this time, the development of racial mentalities and designs and the part of African Americans in bringing change within the Reconstruction. Additionally, another subject that Foner states in the book, is the development of a national state through the Civil War and Reconstruction that confined another arrangement of purposes with level rights to all Americans paying little to their race and the way changes in the North’s economy after
Historical events fall along the lines of celebrating holidays such as Black History Month in school or even church. William E Cross ’s Nigresence model discusses five stages which include emersion, immersion, pre-encounter, encounter, and internalization commitment. First, the pre-encounter stage happened in middle school being exposed to so many Caucasian people, and considering how a like we acted. Acted which means growing up in the country and using the same slang as well as taking a liking in the same activities.
The two critical theories studied this week, new historicism and cultural criticism, share many of the same concepts. Both theories are under the belief that history and culture are complex and that there is no way for us to fully understand these subjects because we are influenced by our subjective beliefs. Also, both theories believe that people are restricted by the limits society sets, and that people and these limits cause friction and struggle. Furthermore, both of these theories share from some of the same influences such as from the French philosopher Michel Foucault. New historicist believe that the writing of history is merely an interpretation, not an absolute fact, other than the big facts we know such as who was president at the time or who won a certain battle.