What makes the French revolution come alive for students today? H. W. Brands tells us about teaching Carlyle’s 1837 account on the NPR book blog, here.
Posted Tuesday, October 16, 2012
H. W. Brands on Ulysses S. Grant
I wrote about Ulysses Grant for two reasons: necessity and curiosity.
H. W. Brands reading from “American Colossus”
H. W. Brands on the Rise of American Capitalism
During the quarter millennium since American independence, two institutions and sets of values have come to characterize American society: democracy and capitalism.
Latin America’s Cold War by Hal Brands (2010)
In this new book, covering the entire period of the Cold War in Latin America, Hal Brands restores agency and initiative to Latin American actors, in the process demolishing many of the platitudes that have governed much of the U.S.foreign policy literature.image Based on prodigious research in a dizzying array of U.S., Latin American, and even East German archives, Brands’s work advances a trenchant interpretation that cannot be ignored.
The Spirit of Honorable Compromise
by H. W. Brands When Benjamin Franklin left the Constitutional Convention in September 1787, he was approached by a woman of Philadelphia, who asked what the deliberations of Franklin and his colleagues had given the young nation. “A republic,” he said, “if you can keep it.” Henry Clay was ten years old that summer. He […]
Empire of Cotton: A Global History by Sven Beckert (2015)
By Edward Watson Sven Beckert places cotton at the center of his colossal history of modern capitalism, arguing that the growth of the industry was the “launching pad for the broader Industrial Revolution.” Beckert follows cotton through a staggering spatial and chronological scope. Spanning five thousand years of cotton’s history, with a particular focus on […]
Cuba on Not Even Past
We have reported on Cuba regularly over the years and link below to all the articles in our archive.
Playing Indian, by Philip Deloria (1999)
By Mark Sheaves Images of American Indians are ubiquitous in contemporary US culture. Step into a convenience store and you can’t help but notice that two of the most popular tobacco brands, Redman Chewing Tobacco and Natural American Spirits, are adorned with the face of a feathered-headdress wearing chief. Approximately 2,000 high schools across the […]
US Survey Course: Presidents Past
During the summer of 2016, we will be bringing together our previously published articles, book reviews, and podcasts on key themes and periods in the history of the USA. Each grouping is designed to correspond to the core areas of the US History Survey Courses taken by undergraduate students at the University of Texas at Austin.