I began last time by making a point about “what if” questions, so let me return to that motif here and just pose the question, which might strike you as outrageous, but it has pedagogical value, I think: what if the United States had lost World War II? How would the world that we’ve all lived in ever since have been different? That’s the strong form of the question. The Pulitzer Prize-winning Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War (1999) recounts the history of the United States in the two great crises of the Great Depression and World War II. Over Here: The First World War and American Society (1980) used the history of American involvement in World War I to analyze the American political system, economy, and culture in the early twentieth century. His 1970 book Birth Control in America: The Career of Margaret Sanger embraced the medical, legal, political, and religious dimensions of the subject and helped pioneer the emerging field of women's history. His scholarship is notable for its integration of economic and cultural analysis with social and political history. Professor Kennedy received his PhD in American studies from Yale. McLachlan Professor of History, Emeritus at Stanford University, delivered the insightful remarks below at “The Making of Modern America,” a June 2011 Humanities Texas teacher institute in Austin.
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