Edward L Ayers

To know the history of the American South, within its own context, is to come to terms with one of modern history's most astonishing, polarizing, and illuminating stories. In these 24 lectures, you'll relive the unforgettable drama of the South, from the rise and fall of the slave South to the making of the New South, examining the full scope of a historical epoch that still affects life in the United States today, through essential topics such as: The...

A revealing history of the formative period when voices of dissent and innovation defied power and created visions of America still resonant today.

American Founders reveals men and women of African descent as key protagonists in the story of American democracy. It chronicles how black people developed and defended New World settlements, undermined slavery, and championed freedom throughout the hemisphere from the sixteenth thorough the twentieth centuries. While conventional history tends to reduce the roles of African Americans to antebellum slavery and the civil rights movement, in reality...

Abstract: These readings provide a glimpse of the vast sweep and profound breadth of Americans' war among and against themselves, adding crucial voices to our understanding of the war and its meaning.