Product Description

In 1893, Frederick Jackson Turner published his revolutionary essay, "The Significance of the Frontier in American History." A century later, many of the country's most innovative scholars of Western history assembled at a conference at Utah State University under the direction of historian Clyde A. Milner II. Here they delivered papers meant to map the exciting new territory opened in recent years in the history of the West. Gathering the best of these essays, this collection aims to produce a compelling assessment of the newest Western historiography. The timely, vigorous entries go beyond conventional narratives of westward expansion, and make clear the stimulating uses of scholarship informed by recent critical and multicultural theory. Contributors include William Deverell on the significance of the West in American history; David Gutierrez on Mexican Americans and cultural identity; Susan Rhoades Neel on nature and the environment; Gail M. Nomura on Asia and Asian Americans; Anne F. Hyde on cultural perceptions; David Rich Lewis on twentieth-century Native Americans; Susan Lee Johnson on men, women and gender; and Quintard Taylor on the history of African Americans in the West. Each essay is accompanied by commentaries written by other top scholars in the field, and the eminent historian Allan G. Bogue supplies a lucid introduction.

Product Details

• Published on: 1999-04-30
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

Review
"This collection is an essential component of the field and points to all the exciting work that has been generated in the last decade. The collection may fuel future debates that will continue to transform historical interpretations of the American West well into the twenty-first century."--New Mexico Historical Review

"...the volume offers a set of fresh but varied approaches which together illuminate the healthy reality that the field's strength comes from its diversity."--Utah Historical Quarterly

"Serious scholars should welcome this thoughtful and well-documented collection of articles...Undoubtedly, the book also will provoke future comment and discussion that can only help sharpen our understanding about a process that was once trivialized in popular culture."--Kansas History

"Any student of the history of the United States West will find this work valuable for becoming acquainted with the major treatises in the many subfields of the West. A New Significance is also deserving of inclusion as a text for seminars and undergraduate classes in the American West."--The Chronicles of Oklahoma

"The collection is a valuable contribution to both 'western' and American history."--American Historical Review

"The essays in A New Significance compel us to reformulate the concept of the West - and ultimately reveal that re-envisioning the region's history has long been the focus of ethnic historians....the essays in A New Significance offer refreshing ways to imagine the western past."--Journal of American Ethnic History

From the Publisher
18 illus.

About the Author
Clyde A. Milner II is Professor of History at Utah State University. Editor of the Western Historical Quarterly, he is co-editor of The Oxford History of the American West (1994).