Bøger udgivet af UNIV PR OF KANSAS

The first book to examine the depictions of Catholics in American popular culture during the critical period between the Great Depression and the height of the Cold War. Looks at the popular films, TV shows, radio programs, and magazine coverage that re-imagined the Catholic role in American culture.

"Contested Valor is an examination of the use and status of black Marines in service during the Cold War era. It is about how these men experienced contested military integration, as well as multiple forms of institutional and social opposition, which called their humanity, manhood, and rights to full citizenship into question. Efforts to undermine their service compromised their right to be counted among the elite and sidelined their story to the fringes of Marine Corps and American history. It also explores the creation of these organizational policies designed to minimize their footprint as U.S. Marines until the social experiment of military integration faded and illustrates the discriminatory practices that further delegitimized their wartime reputation. Cameron McCoy describes the factors and pressures leading to the racial turbulence that surfaced in the Marine Corps from the end of World War II through Vietnam, and the measures taken by civilian and Marine officials to maintain and restore organizational integrity based on a foundation of white supremacy. McCoy examines the psychological effects of institutionalized racism on African American Marines during the Vietnam era and the emergence of a new generation of blacks unwilling to submit to the traditions of a Jim Crow Marine Corps. By exploring the realities American society created about black Marines, this work calls attention to the diverse ways in which these men coped within a strict prejudiced organization and found greater purpose as U.S. Marines despite an embattled image"--

The question Americans asked in 1844 was, "Who the hell is James K. Polk?"Polk, of course, was not unknown, but was a highly unlikely presidential candidate given the availability of better-known options. Among the Democrats, this included Martin Van Buren, John C. Calhoun, and James Buchanan. Among the Whigs, Henry Clay was the clear frontrunner. Complicating the election were three other candidates: President John Tyler, a man without a party; Joseph Smith, the self-described prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the first presidential candidate to be assassinated; and James G. Birney, head of the antislavery Liberty ticket. On top of this remarkable cast of characters, the stakes of the election were high as the United States was undergoing a tumultuous political transition.James K. Polk's ascension to the White House over more notable politicians was a pivotal moment in propelling the United States towards civil war, and the 1844 election expanded the vigorous campaigning that had been growing since 1824. In Who is James K. Polk?, Mark R. Cheathem examines the transition from traditional political issues, such as banking and tariffs, to newer ones, like immigration and slavery. The book also captures the Whig and Democratic parties at a mature stage of competition and provides detailed descriptions of campaign tactics used by the candidates, including rallies, music, and political cartoons.Cheathem has written the definitive account of this important election in this volume for the esteemed American Presidential Elections series.

"In Bayou Battles for Vicksburg, the third in sequence but fourth-published volume in his five-volume history of the Vicksburg Campaign of the American Civil War, Tim Smith chronicles the third through seventh attempts by Ulysses S. Grant to capture the Confederate stronghold of Vicksburg, Mississippi. The accepted strategy up to this point [in the] war was aligned with the principles of the Swiss theorist Antoine-Henri Jomini, whose work was taught at West Point, where commanders on both sides of the conflict had been educated. But Jomini didn't have anything to say about creeks, rivers, and bayous in a subtropical swamp environment. Moreover, Jomini emphasized secure supply lines and a slow, steady, unified approach to a target such as Vicksburg. Grant threw out the book with a bold, and ultimately successful, plan to divide his forces to accomplish multiple goals and to confuse the enemy by cutting levies, flooding whole sections of watersheds, and bypassing strongholds by digging canals far around them, thus avoiding a direct approach. Once Grant finally reached the high, dry ground on the east side of the Mississippi River on May 1, the next phase began: the inland overland campaign began, and it continued for the next seventeen days. This will be covered in the next, and last, in the series of Smith's Vicksburg volumes"--

"Like Men of War, originally published in 1998 by Little, Brown, was a groundbreaking early study of Black troops in the Civil War that It is still considered a major contribution to the literature on the USCT. This is a chronological operational history. Trudeau covers every major engagement in which the United States Colored Troops (USCT) participated, as well as some minor ones. He quotes generously from primary documents, including Black soldiers' letters. John David Smith said of the first edition, "Like Men of War is important and relevant because it remains the only extant narrative history of Black troops in the Union Army aimed at both general readers and scholars and students. William A. Dobak's Freedom by the Sword (2011), although an excellent work, is a finely-tuned tactical and strategic study, but one that omits the human element and fine writing that Trudeau's book exudes. It serves more as a tactical manual, not a monograph. Also, Dobak's logistical and institutional study is "dry as dust" whereas Trudeau's book breathes life into the men and battles of the USCT." What's new in the second edition: Updated language, e.g., "owner" to "enslaver"; Text changes throughout - words, sentences, paragraphs; New photographs (we're only using five from the first edition), and placed throughout rather than gathered together; New chapters/sections: see TOC"--

"Serpents of War is an abridged edition of a nearly 200,000-word World War I memoir by Pennsylvanian Major Harry Dravo Parkin: Memoirs of World War I, being an account of the experiences of an American Officer wounded and captured by the Germans. The original memoir resides in Gettysburg College's Musselman Library. Offering the perspective of a mid-level officer responsible for the lives and welfare of over a thousand men, Parkin conveys the stress of command at a time when one innocent blunder could cost an officer his combat assignment, brings the inferno of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive to life in terrifying, gory detail, and recounts an experience undergone by very few American soldiers in 1918-that of being taken prisoner (while wounded no less) by the Imperial German Army. This is a book by a brave soldier, a recipient of the Distinguished Service Cross for his heroism on the battlefield, who was also a gifted writer. Parkin's narrative seldom strains for effect. Its prose is unassuming and workmanlike. Nevertheless, readers of Serpents of War will likely agree that Parkin possessed of a strong sense of setting, a knack for capturing the chaos and strange exhilaration of battle, and a sharp eye for the interpersonal, social dynamics of military life-the personality clashes and simmering feuds, as well as the moments of comradeship and accord. There is no other American World War I memoir quite like it"--

In contemporary constitutional politics, Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment--which includes the citizenship, privileges and immunities, due process, and equal protection clauses--is the star of the show. But this was not the focus for the Republican members of the Thirty-Ninth Congress. Their interest was instead in Sections 2, 3, and 4. Today we tend to think the purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment was to protect persons of color. But the Republicans engaged in Reconstruction saw its purpose as preventing "rebel rule" by punishing treason and rewarding loyalty, particularly the loyalty of white men who remained faithful to the Union during the Civil War.In this first of three planned volumes for the University Press of Kansas's Constitutional Thinking series, Mark A. Graber aims to restore to contemporary memory the Fourteenth Amendment drafted by those Republican and Unionist members of Congress who supported congressional reconstruction.In Punish Treason, Reward Loyalty, Graber breaks new ground researching Reconstruction, the Fourteenth Amendment, and constitutionalism by highlighting the importance of Sections 2, 3, and 4 to the representatives in the Thirty-Ninth Congress and their relative indifference to Section 1. His work underscores the importance and impact that legislative primacy and partisan supremacy had to Republican constitutional thinking about constitutional authority immediately after the Civil War.Centered on Reconstruction and constitutional reform, Graber shows anew the Republican effort to prevent rebel rule by empowering and protecting loyalty.