Trump Syllabus Reader

This week we read From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime by Elizabeth Hinton to examine the topic “Racial Double Standards Under Mass Incarceration.” Hinton’s thorough, detailed research illustrates the federal government’s role in the 943% increase in the prison population since the 1960s and its disproportionate impact on African-American and Latino men.   Hinton argues that even though the War on Poverty is often held up as a shining example of liberalism’s potential benefits, it actually is best understood as a byproduct of the country’s anxieties about race. From the 1960s through the 1980s politicians from both the Republican and Democratic parties shifted away from policies targeting poverty as the cause of crime to instead assume colored communities had flawed “pathologies” making them susceptible to crime, pathologies that could only be broken by instituting a fear of prison or by simply jailing huge percentages of the population (for a copy of my notes, see her...

This week we read Gail Bederman ’s book Manliness and Civilization . I wanted to read this book for a somewhat selfish reason – I am currently writing a dissertation chapter about sports in the early twentieth century and knew it would be relevant to my work. While relevant to my particular historical project, it also provides us with valuable insights into contemporary American culture. At forty-five pages, the book’s introduction may seem intimidating, but it laid out almost all of its key ideas (for a copy of my notes, see here ).   It’s possible to see this introductory chapter as two mini-chapters surrounding a classic introduction – we learned about Jack Johnson, then received the thesis/histoirogrpahy/key theme information, then briefly read about the Chicago Columbian Exhibition – and perhaps it would be helpful to think of this chapter in these terms. On pages five through thirty Bederman lays out these big ideas and the “discourse” surrounding them. By discourse ...

This week we read Contraception and Abortion in Nineteenth-Century America by Janet Farrell Brodie .   Although the book is only partially focused on the syllabus’s broader topic of “Misogyny, Sexism, and Shaming the Female Body,” I wanted to read it for specific, personal reasons: Professor Brodie was my advisor while I was working on my master’s degree, yet I had never read this book.   While its focus may be a more distant past than several of the books we have read thus far, I believe it still offers us insights into important issues facing out country today. Brodie’s thesis connects the reader to debates surrounding control of women’s bodies, observing that contraception and abortion had been an important yet discrete part of family planning for the first 200 years of the country’s history. However, during the nineteenth century its increasing presence in advertisements and public forums made social purity advocates uncomfortable, and as a result they worked to refra...

This week we read Becoming Mexican American by George Sanchez , a book I had heard about through previous immigration history courses though never actually picked up.   After finishing it, I realized why it has remained a staple of such courses nearly twenty-five years after its initial publication – Sanchez provides a thorough and thoughtful examination of immigrant culture as it forms within the United States. Sanchez explores the development of Mexican American culture in Los Angeles by using a variety of sources that provide him with immigrants’ personal perspectives (for a copy of my notes, see here ).   His source base includes the naturalization applications for Mexican immigrants seeking to become American citizens – he notes that these applications are unique in capturing the feelings of immigrants who feel a sense of permanence in the United States and describe their lives in greater detail than many other sources.   He also relies on government papers from...

This week we read Migra! by Kelly Lytle Hernandez to examine the topic “Illusions of National Security.” The book is an excellent continuation of many ideas we explored last week in Impossible Subjects and provides important insight into the forces shaping our country’s immigration policy. The book’s subtitle tells us exactly who this history will focus on – the US Border Patrol (for a copy of my notes – see here ). Hernandez illustrates how the Border Patrol was able to shape the country’s ideas and policies regarding immigration, illegality, and race despite its relatively specific role as an enforcement agency, which is not usually framed as a role driving policy.   She is able to reframe the Border Patrol through her sources – the federal government’s collections at the National Archives as well as personal materials found at the Border Patrol’s Museum – that provide specifics on who the Border Patrol’s employees were and how they viewed their service.   Interesti...