The 20th century has been labeled as "the American century," while the beginning of the 21st is identified as a time of decline for the United States. Is American governance still functioning within and what weight does the United States carry on a global level? The course provides an analysis of the emergence of the country as a world power throughout the 20th century, up to the presidency of Obama, within the framework of the new methodological approach of transnational history. The exceptionalist model no longer applies and American history is in need of revision. Students will therefore deal with the major issues of domestic policy while analyzing the new role the United States has come to play in the past few decades globally. The goal of the course is to provide students both with a general methodology for the study of the United States in a global sphere and an understanding of American politics and society in the past century.
teacher profile teaching materials
The course aims to provide students with the ability to think critically about the United States in the last hundred years and the contemporary world as seen from the American perspective. International studies today entails a good understanding of American culture and history: because of the nation’s role worldwide and because the new methodologies in cultural and transnational studies developed in the United States, especially in the second half of the 20th century. Therefore, by the end of the course, students will be knowledgeable about major aspects of U.S. history in the last 150 years both at a domestic and international level. Moreover, they will acquire an understanding of the major methodologies used by American scholars to study their country from a transnational and international perspective.
This course is taught in English.
Joshua Freeman, American Empire: The Rise of a Global Power, the Democratic Revolution at Home, 1945-2000 (New York: Penguin, 2013).
Robert W. Rydell and Rob Kroes, Buffalo Bill in Bologna: The Americanization of the World, 1869-1922, Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 2005. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Daniel Rogers, "Improvising the New Deal" in Franklin D. Roosevelt : Road to the New Deal, 1882-1939, University of Illinois Press, 2015, pp. 131-157. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
William E. Luechtenburg, Franklin D. Roosevelt: Foreign Affairs, The Miller Center, https://millercenter.org/president/fdroosevelt/foreign-affairs
Wendy Wall, The New Deal, Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History, 2016.
The Constitution of the United States of America. http://archives.gov/exhibits/charters/ constitution.html or on the Professor's webpage under "materiali didattici)
For the in class discussion and presentations, students can choose one among the following six essays:
Thomas Bender, “The Boundaries and Constituencies of History,” American Literary History, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Summer, 2006), pp. 267-282 + “Global History and Bounded Subjects: A Response to Thomas Bender” by Peter Fritzsche, American Literary History, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Summer, 2006), pp. 283-287, Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Erez Manela, The United States in the World, in Foner E, McGirr L. American History Now. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2011, pp. 201-220. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Hilde E. Restad, “Old Paradigms in History Die Hard in Political Science: US Foreign Policy and American Exceptionalism,” American Political Thought, Vol. 1, No. 1 (May 2012), pp. 53-76. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Richard Slotkin, "Thinking Mythologically: Black Hawk Down, the “Platoon Movie,” and the War of Choice in Iraq," in European Journal of American Studies, 12, 2 (2017). Available online at: https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/11873
Ian Tyrrell, “Reflections on the transnational turn in United States history: theory and practice.” Journal of Global History (2009) 4, pp. 453–474. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Isabelle Vagnoux, "Introduction: North American Women in Politics and International Relations;" Chantal Maillé, "Feminist Interventions in Political Representation in the United States and Canada: Training Programs and Legal Quotas," in European Journal of American Studies, 10, 1 (2015). Available online at: https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/10368
RECOMMENDED READINGS:
Amitav Acharya, The End of the American World Order (Polity Press, 2014).
Bacevich, Andrew, The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2006).
Belmonte, Laura, Selling the American Way: U.S. Propaganda and the Cold War (Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008).
Bender, Thomas, A Nation among Nations: America’s Place in the World (New York: Hill and Wang, 2006).
Borstelmann, Thomas The Cold War and the Color Line (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
2003).
Brooks, Stephen and William Wohlforth, America Abroad: The US Global Role in the 21st century, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).
de Grazia, Victoria, Irresistible Empire: America's Advance Through Twentieth-Century Europe,
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005).
Gerstle, Gary, American Crucible: Race and Nationalism in the Twentieth Century (Princeton
University Press, 2001).
Hofstadter, Richard, The Age of Reform (New York: Vintage, 1955) (or any later edition).
Hunt, Michael, Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1987).
Ikenberry, John Liberal Leviathan: The Origins; Crisis and Transformation of the American World Order, (Princeton University Press, 2011)
Jackson Lears, T., Rebirth of a Nation: The Making of Modern America (New York: Harper Colins, 2010).
Kennedy, David M., Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929- 1945 (Oxford History of the United States) (Oxford University Press, 2001).
Perlstein, Rick, The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2015).
Rodgers, Daniel, Atlantic Crossings: Social Politics in a Progressive Age (New York: Belknap, 2000).
Programme
This course intends to offer students an insight on American history and culture from international and transnational perspectives. The role played by the United States in international affairs in the 20th century is one that scholars have come to label the intervening period between the Spanish-American War and the end of the Cold War, the American Century. Currently, the U.S. still plays a major role in international relations, despite the crisis started in the 1970s, while its position and interaction with the rest of the world was already prominent in the 19th century. Moreover, U.S. history, like the history of other countries, was forged by the country’s interaction with other parts of the world and by the inevitable transnational connections with other nations. The course therefore offers an interpretation of American history from a transnational perspective while familiarizing the students with some of the major historians of the past century and with the more recent historiography, methodology and critical analyses of American history.The course aims to provide students with the ability to think critically about the United States in the last hundred years and the contemporary world as seen from the American perspective. International studies today entails a good understanding of American culture and history: because of the nation’s role worldwide and because the new methodologies in cultural and transnational studies developed in the United States, especially in the second half of the 20th century. Therefore, by the end of the course, students will be knowledgeable about major aspects of U.S. history in the last 150 years both at a domestic and international level. Moreover, they will acquire an understanding of the major methodologies used by American scholars to study their country from a transnational and international perspective.
This course is taught in English.
Core Documentation
REQUIRED READINGS:Joshua Freeman, American Empire: The Rise of a Global Power, the Democratic Revolution at Home, 1945-2000 (New York: Penguin, 2013).
Robert W. Rydell and Rob Kroes, Buffalo Bill in Bologna: The Americanization of the World, 1869-1922, Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 2005. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Daniel Rogers, "Improvising the New Deal" in Franklin D. Roosevelt : Road to the New Deal, 1882-1939, University of Illinois Press, 2015, pp. 131-157. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
William E. Luechtenburg, Franklin D. Roosevelt: Foreign Affairs, The Miller Center, https://millercenter.org/president/fdroosevelt/foreign-affairs
Wendy Wall, The New Deal, Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History, 2016.
The Constitution of the United States of America. http://archives.gov/exhibits/charters/ constitution.html or on the Professor's webpage under "materiali didattici)
For the in class discussion and presentations, students can choose one among the following six essays:
Thomas Bender, “The Boundaries and Constituencies of History,” American Literary History, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Summer, 2006), pp. 267-282 + “Global History and Bounded Subjects: A Response to Thomas Bender” by Peter Fritzsche, American Literary History, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Summer, 2006), pp. 283-287, Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Erez Manela, The United States in the World, in Foner E, McGirr L. American History Now. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2011, pp. 201-220. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Hilde E. Restad, “Old Paradigms in History Die Hard in Political Science: US Foreign Policy and American Exceptionalism,” American Political Thought, Vol. 1, No. 1 (May 2012), pp. 53-76. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Richard Slotkin, "Thinking Mythologically: Black Hawk Down, the “Platoon Movie,” and the War of Choice in Iraq," in European Journal of American Studies, 12, 2 (2017). Available online at: https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/11873
Ian Tyrrell, “Reflections on the transnational turn in United States history: theory and practice.” Journal of Global History (2009) 4, pp. 453–474. Available online in the University Discovery Web pages.
Isabelle Vagnoux, "Introduction: North American Women in Politics and International Relations;" Chantal Maillé, "Feminist Interventions in Political Representation in the United States and Canada: Training Programs and Legal Quotas," in European Journal of American Studies, 10, 1 (2015). Available online at: https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/10368
RECOMMENDED READINGS:
Amitav Acharya, The End of the American World Order (Polity Press, 2014).
Bacevich, Andrew, The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2006).
Belmonte, Laura, Selling the American Way: U.S. Propaganda and the Cold War (Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008).
Bender, Thomas, A Nation among Nations: America’s Place in the World (New York: Hill and Wang, 2006).
Borstelmann, Thomas The Cold War and the Color Line (Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
2003).
Brooks, Stephen and William Wohlforth, America Abroad: The US Global Role in the 21st century, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).
de Grazia, Victoria, Irresistible Empire: America's Advance Through Twentieth-Century Europe,
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005).
Gerstle, Gary, American Crucible: Race and Nationalism in the Twentieth Century (Princeton
University Press, 2001).
Hofstadter, Richard, The Age of Reform (New York: Vintage, 1955) (or any later edition).
Hunt, Michael, Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1987).
Ikenberry, John Liberal Leviathan: The Origins; Crisis and Transformation of the American World Order, (Princeton University Press, 2011)
Jackson Lears, T., Rebirth of a Nation: The Making of Modern America (New York: Harper Colins, 2010).
Kennedy, David M., Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929- 1945 (Oxford History of the United States) (Oxford University Press, 2001).
Perlstein, Rick, The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2015).
Rodgers, Daniel, Atlantic Crossings: Social Politics in a Progressive Age (New York: Belknap, 2000).
Reference Bibliography
No additional readings provided.Type of delivery of the course
CONTENT: PART I – Introduction, methodologies and major issues. Weeks 1-2 Introduction and description of the course: methodological issues and new approaches to U.S. History. From exceptionalism to transnational history. The foundations of American democracy: the Constitution and its current value. Universal values and their domestic implementation. Weeks 3-4 Preparing for the 2018 mid-term elections. The americanization of the world and American new transnationalism The United States and the world: isolationism and internationalism in historical perspective. (In the third week the class will visit the Department Library and will familiarize with paper and electronic reference material) PART II The United States’ rise to world power Week 5 The American century: from the Spanish-American War to 9/11. World War I, the United States’ rise to global power. Rooseveltian or Wilsonian century? Week 6 The Progressive legacy: Reform and the role of the State in the age of empires and totalitarian states. American Soft Power and mass society. Week 7 Booms, busts and reforms. From WWI to the Cold War: American domestic policy and economic transformation. (In the seventh week the class will visit the Library of the Center of American Studies and will familiarize with paper and electronic reference material) Weeks 8 Democracy, liberalism and the world. American civil rights and human rights in the world. PART III A short American Century? Weeks 9-10 From the struggle on civil rights to the students’ revolts and Vietnam. The crisis of the American model. The 1960s and 1970s. Week 11 The end of the Cold War: what role for the United States? Reagan, the implosion of the Soviet Union and the new relations with Europe and Asia. Week 12 Toward the 21st century and beyond. 9/11, new challenges, renewed wars and the new interpretations of American history and global role.Attendance
ATTENDANCE POLICY: Attendance is mandatory for all classes. If a student misses more than three classes, 2 percentage points will be deducted from the final grade for every additional absence. Any exams, tests, presentations, or other work missed due to student absences can only be rescheduled in cases of documented medical emergencies or family emergencies.Type of evaluation
Attendance and participation (20%); mid-term written test (25%); in class oral presentation (30%); in class final (25%). The mid-term and the final consist of IDs and short essays based on the lectures, the two books, and the articles indicated in the required readings section. The presentations and following class discussion concentrate on the essays indicated in the required readings section. Access to this material can be either obtained through the online subscriptions of our university or through the electronic resources offered by the Centro Studi Americani. In the second week of class, the professor will explain how to prepare for the presentations, which will take place toward the end of the course. In order to approach the methodological discussion in the best way possible, the class will take two field-studies in the libraries of the Department and of the Center of American Studies.