This unit takes us into recent times: from the 1970s to today; a fifty year period that has produced stunning and swift social and technological changes.
Chapter 28 is entitled “The Unraveling” as Americans experienced an increasingly integrated and diverse society along with economic uncertainties. The 1980s is called the “Triumph of the Right” as conservatives moved the nation on a rightward path in response to 50 years of liberal governance and court decisions. The final chapter culminates our study of American history by taking us to January 6th and the “Stop the Steal” mob that stormed the Capitol in 2021.
How did we get to this point today? The textbook says in Chapter 30 that, “Revolutionary technological change, unprecedented global flows of goods and people and capital, an amorphous decades-long War on Terror, accelerating inequality, growing diversity, a changing climate, political stalemate: our present is not an island of circumstance but a product of history.”
In our final evaluation, I’d like you to select TWO documents from EACH the final three chapters of the textbook reader that demonstrate the validity of that thesis. What documents do you see that reflect the recent past that has brought us to this point in time? What events, people, trends do you see in these documents that have created and are responsible for the world we live in right now?
1. Select two: https://www.americanyawp.com/reader/28-the-unraveling/
Links to an external site.
2. Select two: https://www.americanyawp.com/reader/29-the-triumph-of-the-right/
Links to an external site.
3. Select two: https://www.americanyawp.com/text/30-the-recent-past/#XPrimary_Sources
Links to an external site.
