Brad Burke wrote:
>When I began to develop a reading list for advanced undergraduate students
>for a new course intended to be the American history component of a
>traditional humanities curricula I thought it would be helpful to ask
>those who teach about the United States in foreign countries what they
>considered the essential primary sources. In addition to such works as
>The Federalist Papers, Democracy in America, etc., what should be included
>in such as list?
I used _Letters from an American Farmer_ as the first to point to ethnic
mixing as a component of what makes an American, and the constitution as
the focus of national loyalty (this is what loyalty oaths are taken to).
But a lot of this will be a judgement call, since the nature of American
national identity is (and has always been) in flux. What is an American?
That is the question that came up most often, and had the most varied
answers, when I was TA in US history in graduate school.
-JOHN <philips@air.akita-u.ac.jp>