Discover American Studies

“E Pluribus Unum – From Many, One”

American History

Author: Jenel Virden

America might often be referred to as a ‘young’ nation with a short past, but its history spans thousands of years. Whether you date the first contact between Europeans and the indigenous people of the North American continent from 1492, when Columbus arrived, or even earlier, when other explorers touched America’s eastern coast, there had already been people living on the continent for many centuries. Study of diverse ‘Native American’ cultures and histories provides a fascinating insight into their societies and reveals the impact that contact with white European settlers had on their way of life. Contrary to popular belief, for example, many of the first relations between whites and Native Americans were peaceful and co-operative. How did peaceful trade relationships, which flourished for many years alongside conflict, give way increasingly to genocide?

From the foundation of the first permanent English settlement at Jamestown in 1607 through to the War of Independence, the whole era of American colonial history contains 170 years of development, embracing hundreds of areas of study, including Puritanism, religion, witch-trials, war, westward expansion, the growth of slavery, and how and why the United States was one of the first parts of the British Empire to gain its independence. The US Constitution that resulted from this last event is a document worthy of study in its own right. And what has the Bill of Rights, added in 1791, meant to the American people? What does it mean to them today?

Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth century the United States expanded, from 13 states hugging the Atlantic coast to 50 states stretching across North America from East to West and taking in Alaska and Hawaii. When studying this crucial period of development you might seek the answers to such questions as:

• To what extent did American feminists shape the international women’s liberation movement?
• How did the US seek to integrate successive waves of immigrants, and with what “successes” and what “failures”?
• How has the history of US foreign policy and international relations led to the war in Iraq?
• What influences have personalities such as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton had on the office of the Presidency?
• Why did the United States go to war in Vietnam?
• Where did the influences on the tumultuous 1960s come from?

Modules on all such aspects of American history can be found in American Studies programmes. For example, you might want to explore African American history. You can trace the transition from the inhuman institution of slavery, though emancipation during the Civil War, reconstruction, the rise of segregation and the post-World War Two Civil Rights Movement, across three centuries. By studying the multi-faceted history of America you can gain a clearer understanding of what has shaped the modern nation.