The American West and the World provides a synthetic introduction to the transnational history of the American West. Drawing from the insights of recent scholarship, Janne Lahti recenters the history of the U.S. West in the global contexts of empires and settler colonialism, discussing exploration, expansion, migration, violence, intimacies, and ideas. Lahti examines established subfields of Western scholarship, such as borderlands studies and transnational histories of empire, as well as relatively unexplored connections between the West and geographically nonadjacent spaces. Lucid and incisive, The American West and the World firmly situates the historical West in its proper global context.

Addressing everything from the details of everyday life to recreation and warfare, this two-volume work examines the social, political, intellectual, and material culture of the American "Old West," from the California Gold Rush of 1849 to the end of the 19th century. What was life really like for ordinary people in the Old West? What did they eat, wear, and think? How did they raise their children? How did they interact with government? What did they do for fun? This encyclopedia provides readers with an engaging and detailed portrayal of the Old West through the examination of social, cultural, and material history. Supported by the most current research, the multivolume set explores various aspects of social history—family, politics, religion, economics, and recreation—to illuminate aspects of a society's emotional life, interactions, opinions, views, beliefs, intimate relationships, and connections between the individual and the greater world. Readers will be exposed to both objective reality and subjective views of a particular culture; as a result, they can create a cohesive, accurate impression of life in the Old West during the second half of the 1800s.

The American West has generated exceptional attention in the past few years, and new scholarship and interpretations have enriched and enlivened the study of its history. Each of the seventeen exciting and provocative essays chosen for this book illuminates an important topic in Western history. Three opening essays by the editors define the West as frontier and region, and place American frontiers in comparative context. Then follow essays that consider women's property rights in Spanish-Mexican California; the mountain men and national identity; Indians and bison on the Great Plains in the early nineteenth century; the Mexican-American War of 1846-1848; the Latter-day Saints from 1830 to 1890; the Sand Creek Massacre of 1864 as a case of Indian-white conflict; cowboys as wage workers in the 1880s; homesteading and the homesteading ideal; miners and ethnic conflict in early-twentieth-century Arizona; the Great Depression in Idaho; how World War II changed Los Angeles; Japanese-American women in World War II; African Americans in the West; and the Pacific Northwest since 1945. The editors also provide a general introduction to the study of Western history and a time line of important events.

Tracing events from the pre-history to the present day, this book offers a concise and accessible history of the American West. Explores the complex interactions between and among cultures in the American West Chronologically organized and informed by the latest scholarship Grounded in attention to race, class, gender, and the environment, the text focuses on social, economic, and political forces that shaped the lived experiences of diverse westerners and influenced the patterns of western history.

Two historians, Robert V. Hine and John Mack Faragher, present the American West as both frontier and region, real and imagined, old and new, and they show how men and women of all ethnic groups were affected when different cultures met and clashed. Their concise and engaging survey of frontier history traces the story from the first Columbian contacts between Indians and Europeans to the multicultural encounters of the modern Southwest. Profusely illustrated with contemporary drawings, posters, and photographs and written in lively and accessible prose, the book not only presents a panoramic view of historical events and characters but also provides fascinating details about such topics as western landscapes, environmental movements, literature, visual arts, and film.

The American West at Risk summarizes the dominant human-generated environmental challenges in the 11 contiguous arid western United States - America's legendary, even mythical, frontier. When discovered by European explorers and later settlers, the west boasted rich soils, bountiful fisheries, immense, dense forests, sparkling streams, untapped ore deposits, and oil bonanzas. It now faces depletion of many of these resources, and potentially serious threats to its few "renewable" resources. The importance of this story is that preserving lands has a central role for protecting air and water quality, and water supplies--and all support a healthy living environment. The idea that all life on earth is connected in a great chain of being, and that all life is connected to the physical earth in many obvious and subtle ways, is not some new-age fad, it is scientifically demonstrable. An understanding of earth processes, and the significance of their biological connections, is critical in shaping societal values so that national land use policies will conserve the earth and avoid the worst impacts of natural processes. These connections inevitably lead science into the murkier realms of political controversy and bureaucratic stasis. Most of the chapters in The American West at Risk focus on a human land use or activity that depletes resources and degrades environmental integrity of this resource-rich, but tender and slow-to-heal, western U.S. The activities include forest clearing for many purposes; farming and grazing; mining for aggregate, metals, and other materials; energy extraction and use; military training and weapons manufacturing and testing; road and utility transmission corridors; recreation; urbanization; and disposing of the wastes generated by everything that we do. We focus on how our land-degrading activities are connected to natural earth processes, which act to accelerate and spread the damages we inflict on the land. Visit www.theamericanwestatrisk.com to learn more about the book and its authors.

Almost a century before their arrival in the English New World, Blacks appeared alongside the Spanish in what is now the American West. Through their families, communities, and institutions, these Western Blacks left behind a long history, which is just now beginning to receive systematic scholarly treatment. Comprehensively indexing a variety of research materials on Blacks in the North American West, Junne offers an invaluable navigational tool for students of American and African-American history. Entries are organized both geographically and topically, and cover a broad range of subjects including cross-cultural interaction, health, art, and law. Contains a complete compilation of African-American newspapers.

Through sweeping entries, focused biographies, community histories, economic enterprise analysis, and demographic studies, this Encyclopedia presents the tapestry of the West and its population during various periods of migration. Examines the settling of the West and includes coverage of movements of American Indians, African Americans, and the often-forgotten role of women in the West's development.

A Companion to the American West is a rigorous, illuminating introduction to the history of the American West. Twenty-five essays by expert scholars synthesize the best and most provocative work in the field and provide a comprehensive overview of themes and historiography. Covers the culture, politics, and environment of the American West through periods of migration, settlement, and modernization Discusses Native Americans and their conflicts and integration with American settlers