Moving On: The American People Since 1945 (4th Edition) - Softcover

Moss, George Donelson

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0205692850 ISBN 13: 9780205692859

Publisher: Pearson, 2009

Synopsis

A comprehensive narrative survey of US History since WWII, this text focuses on the public life of the American people. It weaves together political, economic, foreign policy, and military history, while incorporating much of the new social, demographic, environmental, and cultural history of the period.

About this title

From the Publisher:

A comprehensive narrative survey of US History since WWII, the text is an expansion of the second part of AMERICA IN THE 20TH CENTURY, 2E. Focusing first on the public life of the American people, the text weaves together political, economic, foreign policy, and military history, while incorporating much of the new social, demographic environmental, and cultural history of the period.

From the Inside Flap:

Preface

Moving On: The American People Since 1945 covers the half-century of American history from the end of World War II to the present; it endeavors to explain how the American nation has become what it is today and how the American people have become what they are today. It represents my best efforts to probe the deeper meanings of the recent historical experiences that have shaped our country and forged the social character of our people. It has been an exciting book to write and revise for a second edition, because our recent past has been, and no doubt will continue to be, supercharged with energy, conflict, and drama. Recent American history is a compelling saga of human struggle, achievement, and failure, full of irony, tragedy, and comedy. I confess that it has been a formidable challenge to try to impose coherent patterns of description, analysis, and interpretation on the mighty spectacle of recent American history—to discern order and purpose amid so much chaos and diversity.

The era that began amidst the storm of the planet's largest war and continues to the present forms a coherent unit of study. It is no wonder that students have made recent U.S. history courses among the most popular currently being offered on the nation's college and university campuses. Paradoxically, most students, even the best and the brightest who have had good high school survey courses in U.S. history, are unlikely to know well the recent history of their country—even though it is that recent history that most usefully illuminates the present and suggests the shape of the future rapidly exploding upon us.

Most U.S. history survey courses scurry through the 1940s and 1950s, only to peter out sometime during the 1960s. Consequently, students do not have a historical understanding of recent events; for most young people, Watergate and the Iran-Contra scandal are merely rhetorical labels, names for events that scarcely one student in ten can discuss meaningfully. Young people often know more about the Spanish-American War than they do about the Persian Gulf War. Having scant historical understanding of recent events, they have little sense of causation or consequences. They lack the experience of constructing meaningful patterns of explanation and interpretation that creates out of these recent events an intelligible, usable past. Did the upheavals of the 1960s have an enduring impact on the status of minorities, women, and young people? How has the legacy of the Vietnam War influenced subsequent American diplomatic and strategic policies? To what extent has the presidency of Bill Clinton been influenced by recent political history? Only a close study of the past fifty years can provide answers to these and the myriad of other questions that thoughtful students bring to the recent U.S. past.

The year 1945 is an appropriate one to begin our story of recent America. World War II signified one of the most profound turning points in the history of the Republic. Out of that horrific conflict came America's involvement in the postwar world, giving rise to the long Cold War struggle with the Soviet Union that dominated U.S. foreign policy for nearly a half-century. Out of World War II came a revitalized, transformed American economy that undergirded the remarkable prosperity that most American families enjoyed for nearly thirty years. Forged within the terrible crucible of war, a new, more egalitarian society emerged that influenced the historical experience of Americans for decades.

During the late 1960s, Americans found themselves embroiled in twin convulsions, full-blown political and cultural crises. These crises occurred because of American involvement in a controversial war in Indochina and because of the rise of domestic insurgencies, of which the militant civil rights movement was the most powerful. War and domestic rebellions combined to polarize Americans in 1968. Political activists clashed with defenders of traditional values and institutions. During the presidential election of 1968, Richard Nixon rallied traditional forces, who then defeated the forces of reform and social activism, ushering in a conservative era that stretched from the 1970s through the 1990s.

Moving On draws upon the work of many scholars who have studied all facets of recent American history. In some instances, most notably in those sections concerned with U.S. interventions in Southeast Asia, culminating in the Vietnam War, I have been able to utilize my own research. Mostly, however, this book is a work of synthesis, a comprehensive narrative that conveys a sizable portion of what professional historians know about recent American history.

I have written a book that retains what is most valuable from traditional public policy approaches to U.S. history: it incorporates political history, economic history, military history, and foreign policy history. These histories are usually told from the top down, from the perspectives of elite groups that have dominated governmental and economic institutions. While retaining some elements of these traditional approaches, I have also integrated much demographic, ecological, and cultural history. During the past fifty years, Americans have developed a vital popular culture. Its most important forms reach most Americans through the mass media of radio, movies, and, most important, television. Sections of many chapters chart the rise of a multimedia-saturated popular culture that is flourishing as the 21st century dawns. Further, I have devoted a good deal of space to the new social history that has enriched our historical literature and greatly expanded our understanding of what constitutes mainstream American history. Much of this new social history, with its focus on issues of class, gender, race, and ethnicity, is told from the perspective of those groups that in the past were either ignored or were perceived as passive objects of more powerful historical agents. Social history is often told from the ground up. Thus you will find that I have given much attention to immigration history, labor history, women's history, gay-lesbian history, African-American history, Hispanic-American history, Asian-American history, and Native American history. The story of recent America includes the stories of all individuals and groups who have played active roles in the unfolding drama.

My inclusive approach amounts to a work of restoration. I aim to restore to the recent past as much of its diversity and complexity as my knowledge and talent permit. Within the traditional framework of public policy history, I have crafted innovative multicultural structures as diverse and dynamic as American society itself. Moving On is a book for everyone, for traditionalists and multicuturalists alike. If I have created the book that I intended, it will be the first study of the recent American past that one reads, not the last. If historical study represents a kind of journey, consider Moving On a point of departure, not a destination.

As a teacher and a textbook writer, I have two important goals: the first is to help the student learn how to think about recent American history, not what to think. The second is to provide the student with a vocabulary to enable him or her to engage in an informed conversation about the recent past, especially about topics that are personally meaningful and relevant. Acknowledgments

Most Homo historienses belong to that privileged category of human beings that has found useful work that is also enjoyable. One of the many features of the historian's profession that makes it so rewarding, so much fun to be a part of, is the incredible generosity of others who so willingly give their time, energies, talents, and knowledge in countless ways. In the creation and revision of Moving On, I am grateful to many people: my students and colleagues at City College of San Francisco and the University of California, San Diego, and friends and other scholars, some of whom embrace disciplines other than history, who also contributed in ways that improved the content, organization, and writing of this book.

To mention a few of the many others who helped: among my colleagues at City College, Edward W. Moreno, Mary Adams, Richard Oxsen, Stephen Moorhouse, and most of all, "Old Faithful," Austin White, who shares my passion for teaching recent U.S. history; among my colleagues at the University of California, San Diego, Daniel Hallin, Michael Schudsen, and Michael Bernstein.

A few of the other scholars who provided invaluable help, either while writing or revising the book, include: Thomas Wolf, Laney College; Bruce Dierenfield, Canisius College; Jeffrey Kimball, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio; Garen Burbank, the University of Winnipeg; Kevin O'Keefe, Stetson University; Paul Conway, Oneonta College; David Hollinger, the University of California, Berkeley; and Ronald G. Walters, the Johns Hopkins University.

Special thanks go to Todd Armstrong, executive editor at Prentice Hall, for giving me an opportunity to create a second edition of Moving On. I only hope that it meets his expectations. I also am grateful to Jean Lapidus, who once again expertly took charge of the production process.

And final thanks to two special people: Mary Chatelier, who used her detective's skills to tease original and wonderfully expressive photographs out of the not-entirely-friendly confines of the Photo Collections of the National Archives, and the lovely Linda, who, forsaking all others, has hitched her team to my wagon. Together it is a grand ride! (But we are a little worried about the horses!)

The author also thanks the following reviewers for their helpful suggestions and comments: Professor Gene A. Sessions, Weber State University; and Professor William Issel, San Francisco State University.

George Donelson Moss

About this edition

• Publisher: Pearson
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0205692850
• ISBN 13: 9780205692859
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 4
• Number of pages: 384