Myth America
A Historical Anthology, Volume 1
2. Edition October 2006
272 Pages, Softcover
Wiley & Sons Ltd
The idea for Myth America grew out of our won teaching experiences. In continuously dealing with students who for the most part were beginning their collegiate study of American history, we found that a thematic approach to the nation's past was stimulating. The theme of myth as threads within the diverse tapestry of cultural experience proved to be especially engaging.
The selected historical myths discussed and analyzed in Myth America can best be understood as a series of false beliefs about America's past. They are false beliefs, however, that have been accepted as true and acted upon as real, and in that acting they have acquired truth. Therefore, myths remain both true and false simultaneously. In fact, the making of myths is a process by which a culture structures its world and perpetuates its grandest dreams.
Acknowledgments.
Introduction.
I. Myths of Reconstruction & the Gilded Age.
Myth of Reconstruction (Eric Foner).
The Lost Cause Myth in the New South Era (Charles ReaganWilson).
The Agrarian Myth (Richard Hofstadter).
Frontierswomen: Myths and Realities (Glenda Riley).
Ten-Gallon Hero: The Myth of the Cowboy (David Brion Davis).
Andrew Carnegie and the Robber Baron Myth (MiltonGoldin).
II. American Myths at Century's End.
The Winning of the West and the Sioux: A Myth (RichardWhite).
Myths of the American West: Missionaries, Entrepreneurs, and NewIdentites (Patricia Nelson LimerickA).
Commanding Performance: Booker T. Washington's AtlantaCompromise Address (David Lionel Smith).
The Horatio Alger Myth (Carol Nackenoff).
Mythology and Workers' Power (Herbert G. Gutman).
The 'May Day' Myth: The Emergence of the UnitedStates as a World Power (Patrick Gerster and NicholasCords).
III. Myths of Progressivism & the 1920s.
The Frontier Myth and Teddy Roosevelt's Fight forConservation (Leroy G. Dorsey).
Woodrow Wilson, Ethnicity, and the Myth of American Unity (HansVought).
Silent Cinema as Historical Mythmaker (John Hope Franklin).
The Myth of the Disillusioned American Soldier (David M.Kennedy).
What Sadie Knew: The Immigrant Working Girl and the Emergence ofthe Modern Young Women (John McClymer).
The Mythic Meaning of Lindbergh's Flight (John WilliamWard).
IV. Myths of Politics & Foreign Affairs.
The Lengthening Shadow of FDR: An Enduring Myth (William E.Leuchtenburg).
The Myth of New Deal Radicalism (Paul K. Conkin).
The Myth of the Good War (Richard Polenberg).
The Myth of the Placid 1950s (Robert D. Marcus).
The Kennedy Myth (Herbert S. Parmet).
'With One Hand Tied Behind Their Back' ... andOther Myths of the Vietnam War (Robert Buzzanco).
The Frontier Myth and the Reagan Presidency (RichardSlotkin).
The Myth of Deterrence and the End of the Cold War (Richard NedLebow and Janice Gross Stein).
V. Social Myths of Modern America.
The Myth of the Feminine Mystique (Joanne Meyerowitz).
Mythology and the Charismatic Leadership of Martin Luther King(Clayborne Carson).
The Chicano Image and the Myth of Aztlan Rediscovered (John R.Chavez).
Streets of Gold: The Myth of the Model Minority (CurtisChang).
Revolution in Indian Country (Fergus M. Bordewich).
Myth, the Melting Pot, and Multiculturalism (Carl N. Degler)
San Jose City College.
Nicholas Cords is Professor Emeritus at Lakewood
Community College/Century College.