America in the World: United States History in Global Context

Since I have been recommending this little gem of a book to history teachers and world historians, I was quite surprised by another reviewer's claim that the book is "one-sided." I thought Carl Guarneri's stance to be thoughtful and reasoned, fairly situating U.S. history in a larger context. It is by design selective in the case studies, as Guarneri devotes less than 300 pages to succinctly take up a limited number of questions in U.S. and world history. Like all histories, it is selective, and thus open for disagreements about what the author chose to include. And, like all histories it should be read with and against other interpretations. That said, I thought the Guarneri's discussions of the frontier, colonies, industrialism, imperialism and connections of US to the world in 19th and 20th centuries were well-chosen, clear, engaging and thoughtful. BTW, the previous reviewer's claim about the book ignoring Tocqueville is incorrect. Indeed, Guarneri urges readers to read the "classic and still-relevant treatise" by Tocqueville. And the book has a short section contrasting various positions in the debate over exceptionalism, before making a case for reconsidering the issue. In short, this is a valuable introduction to an increasing move by historians to help us understand U.S. history by placing it on the world stage (see for example Tom Bender's A Nation Among Nations). It is a good introduction for students of both U.S. and world history.

This little book has taken on the big task of situating America's past within global history. It has done this extraordinarily well. The author's judgments about American exceptionalism, which run throughout the work, are measured and incisive. The high levels of analysis and synthesis reflect the author's wide reading of sources on a range of topics including migrations, comparative economic development, and empire-building from the last Ice Age to today. Perhaps best of all the writing is organized and sentences have to be read only once to be fully understood. Warning: Readers will wish they had written this book.