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On Immigration
Prof. Scott Wong of Williams College recommends that you read:
1. John Bodnar, The Transplanted: A History of Immigrants in Urban America
(Interdisciplinary Studies in History)
- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: Indiana University Press; Reprint edition (February 1,
1987)
- ISBN: 025320416X
2. Donna Gabacci, From the Other Side: Women, Gender & Immigrant Life
in the U.S., 1820-1990
- Paperback: 192 pages
- Publisher: Indiana University Press (December 1, 1994)
- ISBN: 0253209048
Editorial Reviews
Midwest Book Review
Immigrant women affected the status of U. S. women, bringing gender roles
from a number of countries to influence gender issues and migration
patterns in this country. Class, cultural influences, and racial issues
are all covered in a fascinating study which begins in 1820 and ends in
1990.
On Industrialization
Prof. Allan Wheelock of Skidmore College (retired) recommends that you read:
1. David F. Burg, Chicago's White City of 1893 (Louisville: University
of Kentucky Press, 1976)
2. Justus D. Donecke, "Myths, Machines, and Markets: The
Columbian Exposition of 1893," Journal of Popular Culture, 6
(1973): 535-49
3. Erik Larsen, The Devil in the White
City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America (New
York: Crown Publishers, 2003)
or the paperback edition
- Paperback: 464 pages
- Publisher: Vintage; Vintage edition (February 10, 2004)
- ISBN: 0375725601
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Author Erik Larson imbues the incredible events surrounding the 1893 Chicago
World's Fair with such drama that readers may find themselves checking the
book's categorization to be sure that The Devil in the White City is
not, in fact, a highly imaginative novel. Larson tells the stories of two
men: Daniel H. Burnham, the architect responsible for the fair's
construction, and H.H. Holmes, a serial killer masquerading as a charming
doctor. Burnham's challenge was immense. In a short period of time, he was
forced to overcome the death of his partner and numerous other obstacles to
construct the famous "White City" around which the fair was built.
His efforts to complete the project, and the fair's incredible success, are
skillfully related along with entertaining appearances by such notables as
Buffalo Bill Cody, Susan B. Anthony, and Thomas Edison. The activities of
the sinister Dr. Holmes, who is believed to be responsible for scores of
murders around the time of the fair, are equally remarkable. He devised and
erected the World's Fair Hotel, complete with crematorium and gas chamber,
near the fairgrounds and used the event as well as his own charismatic
personality to lure victims. Combining the stories of an architect and a
killer in one book, mostly in alternating chapters, seems like an odd choice
but it works. The magical appeal and horrifying dark side of 19th-century
Chicago are both revealed through Larson's skillful writing. --John Moe--This
text refers to the Hardcover
edition.
4. Jay Martin, Harvests of Change: American Literature, 1865-1914
(Englewood Cliff, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1957
5. Lewis Mumford, Sticks and Stones: American Architecture and
Civilization (New York: Dover, 1955)
6. Donald Pizer, ed. American Thought and Writing in the 1890s
(Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1972)
7. Robert W. Rydell, All the World's a Fair: Visions of Empire at
American International Expositions, 1876-1916 (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1984)
- Paperback: 338 pages
- Publisher: University of Chicago Press; Reprint edition (October
15, 1987)
- ISBN: 0226732401
| Reviewer: |
Tanja
Laden (Los Angeles, CA USA) - |
Robert W. Rydell's book, All the World's a Fair: Visions of Empire at
American International Expositions, 1876-1916 is far different a study
than Roy Rosenzweig's, yet it offers some interesting insights into how
the moneyed leisure class still indulged in luxuries of their own. Rydell
writes that the impetus behind world's fairs was to boost the economy
while maintaining an American authority over the displays. Just as saloons
and amusement parks were necessary for America's working class, the
World's Fairs were designed for the leisure class.
The world fairs of 1876-1916 betrayed a much more sinister agenda. Ideas
of American progressed became related to scientific racism. The widening
concern over immigration by the leisure class eventually promoted
eugenicist ideas about the hierarchy of white populations.
World's fairs did not stand in direct opposition to the leisure pastimes
of the working class. In fact, they utilized them to
"scientifically" and racially segregate members of the American
population.
Rydell argues that the world's fairs in America from 1876-1916 were a
material vision of political, business, and intellectuals to promote their
vision of racial dominance. Thus, so far we have witnessed segregation of
leisure along class lines but not until reading , All the World's a Fair:
Visions of Empire at American International Expositions, 1876-1916 is it
so clear that the elements of leisure rested on racial superiority.8. Robert Rydell et al, Fair America World's Fairs in the United States
(Washington:, D.C. Smithsonian, 2000)
- Paperback: 166 pages
- Publisher: Smithsonian Books (March, 2000)
- ISBN: 1560983841
Not mere "encyclopedias of civilization," world's fairs
galvanized national support for social reunification after the Civil
War, celebrated the U.S. imperial expansionism that followed,
generated consumer optimism during the Great Depression, and promoted
the essential unity of humankind in the nuclear age. Rydell (history,
Montana State Univ.; All the World's a Fair and World of Fairs), John
Findling (history, Indiana Univ. Southeast; Chicago's Great World's
Fairs) and Kimberly Pelle (admissions, Indiana Univ. Southeast;
Historical Dictionary of World's Fairs and Expositions) show that
world's fairs have not only showcased cultural and technological
aspects of society but have "contribute[d] to the cultural milieu
of societies that have hosted them." Filled with archival
photographs and boasting a section of extensive notes, Fair America
examines and documents 30 world's fairs from 1853 to 1984. It would
seem to be the definitive work, exploring the intentions of
organizers, the perceptions of audiences, and the way minorities
challenged stereotypes at each fair. Any school, public, or academic
library would welcome this systematic work. DKay Meredith Dushek,
Anamosa, IA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
9. PBS Home Video--American Visions: The History of American Art and
Architecture. Vol. 4, The Gilded Age. Hosted by Robert Hughes.
Distributed by Warner Home Video, 1997
Copyright 2005 - 2007, Teaching American
History
www.castleton.edu/TAH
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