Customer Reviews

A History of the United States

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I am currently a first year high school teacher whose school has chosen Boorstin to for U.S. I and II. Boorstin's writing is unbelievably frustrating on so many levels. For advanced level students, the text is woefully incomplete. It seems clear that the author's focus was to be concise and simple; however what ends up happening as a result is that things such as causations and analysis are frequently left out. Advanced students will likely become frustrated over knowing the basic facts but not getting anywhere deeper - why did they happen? What historical debates have been had over the facts?

Ironically, my lower level students also hate the book and find it difficult to understand. Boorstin's review questions vary in difficulty between amusingly easy to impossibly hard - making many students apathetic about doing homework (even more than normal). In addition, Boorstin occasionally asks questions that are not referred to in the chapter. The editing in the book is seriously flawed.

The use of Boorstin's book puts the emphasis and burden of knowledge squarely on the teacher. Student-centered activities using the text become significantly harder (or, in the case of some new teachers, impossible) because there simply is not enough information provided to allow for students' opinions or creativity. Critical events in American history are left out - Bacon's rebellion for example is nowhere to be found. Other events, when covered, are woefully out of place - the Middle Passage is covered only two chapters before the Civil War!

Overall, Boorstin's text tries very hard to be a jack-of-all- trades, but fails to really satisfy anyone in the classroom. Avoid it.

This book is required for both sophomore and junior level US history, and it is terrible to say the least.
All matter of information is slapped together haphazardly to create an unappetizing blend of dry facts with painfully un-witty side comments added by the author of this monstrosity.
It is not organized in any fashion except chronological order. Unlike other better textbooks, by flipping to a page you cannot tell what chapter or subject you are in, and wallow in the fact that you have to read the incoherent jumble of ink on the page to determine it.
I am not looking forward to using it next year, it was extremely difficult to learn from and our teacher had to extract the information and return it to us in the form of notes. We rarely used it because it was so incredibly hard to follow.
Please avoid this book.

Sorely lacking in fact and loaded with literary exaggerations that are poor attempts to generate reader interest. Facts are facts. Fiction is fiction. This text is much more the latter, laced with opinion and revisionist slants. As informal and incomplete as it is, even Wikipedia is a better written source!

I use this text book in my US History class, which is required for juniors in California. I find the book to offer information about American History in a way that is palatable to students and workable for teachers. No textbook is perfect! A teacher using this textbook cannot expect the book to do all of the work. I have been creative in my teaching methods using this book by incoroporating discussion, modern film, additional primary resources, modern music lyrics, etc... Additionally, I have students apply what they have learned about American History in semester and year-end projects. To sum it up... the book is not everything and not perfect, but can work extremely well with an effective teacher.

This book is wicked hard to understand and follow!!! I am 17 years old and i am in a college prep american history class, and i dont understand. How am i supossed to learn anything if i cant read the words!!!