I. INTRODUCTION: THE IDEA OF AMERICA
1. America and Cosmic Man, Wyndham Lewis, pp. 11-35 (Chapters 1-4); pp.
167-194 (Chapters 20-24)
2. The Disuniting of America, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., Chapter 1 (“A New
Race”)
3. The Cycles of American History, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., Chapter 1
(The Theory of America: Experiment or Destiny”)
4. “The Native Bias,” Philip Rahv
5. The American Commonwealth, Daniel Bell
(“The End of American Exceptionalism”)
II. RELIGIOUS ORIGINS: CALVINISM & ORIGINAL SIN
1. “Churches and Sects in North America,” Max Weber
2. “Judaism, Christianity, and the Socioeconomic Order,” Max Weber
3. Who Are We?, Samuel P. Huntington, Chapters 3-4 (“Components of
American Identity” and Anglo-Protestant Culture”)
4. The Puritan Origins of the American Self, Sacvan Bercovitch, Chaps. 1, 3, 5
(“Puritanism and the Self,” “The Elect Nation,” and “The Myth of America”
5. The Scarlett Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
III. RELIGIOUS ORIGINS (2): GOD’S AMERICAN ISRAEL
1. The Irony of American History, Reinhold Niebuhr, Chapter 2 (“The Innocent
Nation in an Innocent World”)
2. “The Archives of Eden,” George Steiner
3. America 1750, Richard Hofstadter, Chapter VII (“The Awakeners”);
Chapter VIII (“The Awakening and the Churches”)
4. “Jonathan Edwards” and “The Solitude of Hawthorne,” Paul Elmer More
5. Moby Dick, Herman Melville, Chapters VII-IX, (“The Chapel,” “The Pulpit,”
“The Sermon)
IV. POLITICAL ORIGINS & FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS
1. Second Treatise of Government, John Locke
2. The American Political Tradition, Richard Hoftstadter, Chapter 1
(“The Founding Fathers”)
3. The Constitution (Preamble), Declaration of Independence, Gettysburg
Address, Abraham Lincoln, The Federalist, No. 45-51
4. Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 (1923)
5. An American Dilemma, Gunnar Myrdal, Vol. 1, Chapter 1
6. Literature in America, “American Literature,” James Feinmore Cooper
V. THE PROMISED LAND
1. “The Significance of the Frontier in American History,” Fredrick J. Turner
2. The Genius of American Politics, “Values Given by the Landscape” and “The
Wilderness Confirms Puritanism,” Daniel Boorstin, pp. 1-50
3. Slouching Towards Bethlehem, Joan Didion (“Notes from a Native Daughter,
“John Wayne: A Love Song,” “7000 Romaine”)
4. Where I Was From, Joan Didion (Parts 3-4)
5. Childhood and Society, Erik Erikson, “Reflections on American Identity”
6. In America, Susan Sontag
VI. THE AGRARIAN REPUBLIC & POPULIST MYTH
1. “Letter to James Madison,” Thomas Jefferson
2. Studies in Classic American Literature, D.H. Lawrence, (“Crèvoceur”)
3. The Age of Reform, Richard Hoftstadter (Chapters 1-2)
4. The Populist Persuasion, Michael Kazin, (Introduction, Chapter 1)
5. The Plot Against America, Philip Roth
6. “Philip Roth’s Populist Nightmare,” Matthew S. Schweber
VII. THE SOUTHERN IDYLL
1. I’ll Take My Stand, “Reconstructed but Unregenerate,” John Crowe Ransom
2. Patriotic Gore, Edmund Wilson, “The Myth of the Old South”
3. The Sound and the Fury & “The Bear,” William Faulkner
4. William Faulkner, Irving Howe, “The Southern Tradition”
5. New and Selected Essays, Robert Penn Warren, “William Faulkner”
6. The Portable Faulkner, Malcolm Cowley, “Introduction;” “Afterword”
VIII. THE PECULIAR INSTITUTION
1. Dred Scott v. Sanford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857)
2. From Slavery to Freedom, John Hope Franklin, Chapters 4-10
3. An American Dilemma, Gunnar Myrdal, Vol. 1, Chapter 10-11
4. Going to The Territory, Ralph Ellison, “Perspectives in Literature,”
“What America Would Be Like Without Blacks”
5. Confessions of Nat Turner, William Styron
6. Amistad, Steven Spielberg
IX. "E PLURIBUS UNUM" or "ONE VERSUS MANY"
1. “Young Americans,” Ralph Waldo Emerson
2. “Civil Disobedience,” Henry David Thoreau
3. Democracy in America, de Tocqueville, Vol. I, Part Two, Chapters 7, 9;
Vol. II, Part Two, Chapters 1-4; Vol. II, Part Three, Chapters 13-14
4. Michael H. v. Gerald D., 491 U.S. 110 (1989);
West Virginia v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943)
5. “Transnationalism,” Randolph Bourne
6. “Metamorphoses of Leatherstocking,” Henry Bamford Parkes
7. “The Point of View,” Henry James
X. THE SELF-MADE MAN & THE GOSPEL OF SUCCESS
1. “The Protestant Ethic & The Spirit of Capitalism,” Max Weber
2. The Liberal Tradition in America, Louis Hartz, Ch. 8, “The American World
of Horatio Alger,” Chapter 8
3. “The Discovery of What it Means to be an American,” James Baldwin
4. “The Pseudo-Conservative Revolt,” Richard Hoftstadter
5. The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
6. Mad Men, Matthew Weiner, S01E12 (“Nixon v. Kennedy”)
XI. HOMO AMERICANUS: THE VERNACULAR STYLE
1. American Humor, Constance Rourke, (Ch. 1-3)
2. Omni-Americans, Albert Murray, “Omni-Americans”
3. Collected Essays, Ralph Ellison, “Richard Wright’s Blues”
“The Novel as a Function of American Democracy”
4. “E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction,” David Foster Wallace
5. The Beer Can by the Highway, John Kouwenhoven, “What’s American
About America?”
6. Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison
XII. REDEEMER NATION: PAX or POX AMERICANA?
1. “The Myth of American Omnipotence,” D.W. Brogan
2. The Irony of American History, Reinhold Niebuhr, Chapters 1, 7
(“The Ironic Element in the American Situation”, “The American Future”)
3. “Dictatorship and Double Standards,” Jeanne Kirkpatrick
4. A Foreigner’s Gift, Fouad Ajami, Chapter 2, (“Chronicle of a War Foretold”)
5. Resurrecting Empire, Rashid Khalidi, Chapter 3
(“America, The West, and Democracy in the Middle East”)
6. Harlot’s Ghost, Norman Mailer, Part I, (“Early Years, Early Training”)
7. The Quiet American, Graham Greene
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