American Cultural History
A Very Short Introduction

A rudimentary overview of a lot of disparate subjects. It didn't really teach me anything new, but it might be a good quick read for someone looking to find an era of American cultural history that strikes their fancy.......more

This was such a brilliant whistle-stop tour of American culture from pre-1800 to 1990s, subjects that I quickly realised I knew surprisingly little about. I loved how fluently and deftly written it was - Avila always emphasises the links between different political/social/historical moments which ma......more

This one didn’t catch my imagination as much as I hoped. Have you ever read a serious conspiracy theory book? In those that I’ve read, the narrative tends to bounce all over the place, tying people, events, history together showing connections, often fantastical. I think of the movie “A Brilliant Mi......more

A good survey of American cultural history, Avila's account minimizes the advancement of a politically-correct outlook that plagues several of the Very Short Introductions I've read so far. But in this case, the inclusion of the advancement of feminist, racial, queer, and other identity politics iss......more

I liked the early chapters, from the colonial period to the end of the 19th century. 20th century stuff was less interesting, and I think, less on target. As a UCLA professor, he has a lot of stuff in here about the movie industry, which is fine, but it seems to me that he overestimated the importan......more