HIST 1148 - FWS: World Order in the American Century

Fall. 3 credits.

B. Cuddy.

In 1941, as the United States was on the cusp of war and world leadership, publisher of Time magazine Henry Luce called for the creation of “the first great American Century.” This course examines how Luce and others envisioned global institutions in an era of U.S. preeminence, and how and to what effect those visions were realized. To make this topic manageable, we will focus on three themes: inter-governmental organization, international law, and development assistance. Students will read works by, or about, figures such as Woodrow Wilson, Henry Ford and Eleanor Roosevelt to help them consider the ways in which the twentieth century was an American Century. And they will imagine themselves as speechwriters or columnists to consider how American the twenty-first century might be.