American Ground: Vistas, Visions, and Revisions

Much has been written about cultural literacy in America in recent years. Some social critics have claimed that most Americans do not know enough about American social history to function in modern society. American Ground hopes to remedy this situation. An epic anthology presenting literary and historical writings from 250 years of American history, American Ground is divided into four parts which flow effortlessly and logically from era to era. Part One “The New Commonwealth,” comprises little-known writings of the Puritan separatists, the Founding Fathers, Alexis de Tocqueville and Thomas Paine. Part Two, “Pluralistic Frontiers,” includes
classic essays on the West from Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, William James, and Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Part Three, “Dreams of Success,” features writings from the Gilded Age up to the Depression; Andrew Carnegie, Thorstein Veblen, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Part Four, “The Irony of American History,” brings us to twentieth century issues of social justice and self-definition, as chronicled by Reinhold Niehuhr, Studs Terkel, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Excerpts in this unique anthology are introduced by a series of brilliant cameo essays, and many of these excerpts raise fundamental issues concerning democracy, civil liberty, and social responsibility, provoking lengthy discussion.

The editors of American Ground, ROBERT H. FOSSUM and JOHN K. ROTH, are professors at Claremont-McKenna College where they team-teach a special class titled “Perspectives on the American Dream.” The writings presented are a distillation of this popular course.