"A profound rumination on the concept of freedom from the New York Times bestselling author of Tribe"-- Throughout history, humans have been driven by the quest for two cherished ideals: community and freedom. The two don't coexist easily. We value individuality and self-reliance, yet are utterly dependent on community for our most basic needs. In this intricately crafted and thought-provoking book, Sebastian Junger examines the tension that lies...

When this award-winning husband-and-wife team discovered that they each had sugar in their family history, they were inspired to trace the globe-spanning story of the sweet substance and to seek out the voices of those who led bitter sugar lives. The trail ran like a bright band from religious ceremonies in India to Europe's Middle Ages, then on to Columbus, who brought the first cane cuttings to the Americas. Sugar was the substance that drove the...

A distinguished history and author of Washington's Crossing analyzes the concepts of liberty and freedom through visions, images, and symbols throughout the folk history of those ideas, showing how they are popular beliefs deeply embedded in American culture rather than political abstractions. Liberty and freedom: Americans agree that these values are fundamental to our nation, but what do they mean? How have their meanings changed through time? In...

"Over the course of our history, freedom has been a living truth for some Americans and a cruel mockery for others. In Eric Foner's stirring history, freedom's story is not the simple unfolding of a timeless truth, but an open-ended history of accomplishment and failure. Its impetus lies in the aspirations and sacrifice of millions of Americans, celebrated and anonymous, who have sought freedom's blessings. Its meaning is shaped not only in congressional...

[This text] is a survey of American history from the earliest days of European exploration and conquest of the New World to the dawn of the twenty-first century. It offers students a ... concise narrative whose central theme is the changing contours of American freedom.... Aimed at an audience of undergraduate students with little or no detailed knowledge of American history, [the text] guides readers through the complexities of the subject without...

Anyone who believes that there are currently serious attempts to transfer American autonomy to the United Nations or to an international commission is a labeled kook, a conspiracy theorist, a member of the "black helicopter crowd." The term is a useful metaphor to capture this attempt to erode our sovereignty by a network of United Nations treaties, codes, guidelines, and other resolutions. They call it "global governance." We call it the end of freedom--the...

"In the vertiginous era of Trump and Marine le Pen, liberalism's status is challenged. There is a widespread fear that liberal values, long taken for granted, are now in danger -- not only from authoritarian countries abroad, but also from a loss of faith inside the liberal world. What happened? Why did liberalism lose the majority support it once enjoyed? And what is so precious about liberalism in the first place? In What Was Liberalism?, award-winning...