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Fighting for America book cover
Fighting for America
The Struggle for Mastery in North America, 1519-1871
2011
First Published
3.50
Average Rating
494
Number of Pages
Prize winning author Jeremy Black traces the competition for control of North America from the landing of Spanish troops under Hernando Cortez in modern Mexico in 1519 to 1871 when, with the Treaty of Washington and the withdrawal of most British garrisons, Britain accepted American mastery in North America. In this wide-ranging narrative, Black makes clear that the process by which America gained supremacy was far from inevitable. The story Black tells is one of conflict, diplomacy, geopolitics, and politics. The eventual result was the creation of a United States of America that stretched from Atlantic to Pacific and dominated North America. The gradual withdrawal of France and Spain, the British accommodation to the expanding U.S. reality, the impact of the American Civil War, and the subjugation of Native peoples, are all carefully drawn out. Black emphasizes contingency not Manifest Destiny, and reconceptualizes American exceptionalism to take note of the pressures and impact of international competition.
Avg Rating
3.50
Number of Ratings
22
5 STARS
23%
4 STARS
32%
3 STARS
23%
2 STARS
18%
1 STARS
5%
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Author

Jeremy Black
Jeremy Black
Author · 90 books

Professor Jeremy Black MBE is an English historian and a Professor of History at the University of Exeter. He is a senior fellow at the Center for the Study of America and the West at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He is the author of over 100 books, principally but not exclusively on 18th-century British politics and international relations, and has been described as "the most prolific historical scholar of our age". Black graduated from Queens' College, Cambridge with a starred first, and then undertook postgraduate work at St John's and Merton Colleges, Oxford. He taught at Durham University for 16 years from 1980 to 1996, firstly as a lecturer and then as a Professor. In 1996 he moved to Exeter University where he took up the post of Professor of History. He has lectured extensively in Australasia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy and the U.S.. He was editor of Archives, the journal of the British Records Association, from 1989 to 2005. He has served on the Council of the British Records Association (1989–2005); the Council of the Royal Historical Society (1993–1996 and 1997–2000); and the Council of the List and Index Society (from 1997). He has sat on the editorial boards of History Today, International History Review, Journal of Military History, Media History and the Journal of the Royal United Services Institute (now the RUSI Journal). He is an advisory fellow of the Barsanti Military History Center at the University of North Texas. He was awarded an MBE in 2000 for services to stamp design, as advisor to the Royal Mail from 1997.

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