History and September 11th (Critical Perspectives on the Past)

From Publishers Weekly
This collection of essays, complete with primary sources, by noted scholars in the fields of terrorism, the Middle East, fundamentalist religious movements, anti-Americanism and foreign relations, attempts to provide a deeper and more nuanced understanding of the factors leading up to the terror attacks on September 11. Each essayist focuses on a distinct part of the puzzle, ranging from the United States' presence in Afghanistan in the 1940s and the results of Cold War patriotism to a 200-year history of Arab-American relations and the notion of American values and nationalism. Collectively, "the authors comment on the dangers of forging or analyzing policy without keen awareness of history, and they tell cautionary tales involving critical moments in the past," all the while rejecting the "sweeping panoramas that portray an age-old 'clash of civilization' between Islam and the West," writes editor Meyerowitz, a professor of history at Indiana University and editor of the Journal of American History. 19 b&w illus., 2 maps. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Book Description
The contributors to this landmark collection set the attacks on the United States in historical perspective. They reject the simplistic notion of an age-old "clash of civilizations" and instead examine the particular histories of American nationalism, anti-Americanism, U.S. foreign policy, and Islamic fundamentalism among other topics. With renewed attention to Americans' sense of national identity, they focus on the United States in relation to the rest of the world. A collection of recent and historical documents—speeches, articles, and book excerpts—supplement the essays. Taken together, the essays and sources in this volume comment on the dangers of seeing the events of September 11 as splitting the nation's history into "before" and "after." They argue eloquently that no useful understanding of the present is possible without an unobstructed view of the past.

From the Publisher
Locating the historical roots of the September 11th attacks

About the Author
Joanne Meyerowitz is Professor of History at Indiana University and editor of The Journal of American History.


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