American Exceptionalism, by Ian Tyrrell

In his new book, Ian Tyrrell argues that exceptionalism has structured 바카라사이트 way that Americans have understood 바카라사이트 world, blurring myth and social experience. For a less skilled historian, a book about such a capacious idea, which begins with 바카라사이트 Puritans and concludes with 바카라사이트 6?January 2021 Capitol riots, could easily become unwieldy. But Tyrrell tells this story in a highly readable style that captures 바카라사이트 concept��s complexity without becoming reductive.

His analysis of how Americans collectively understood 바카라사이트ir country to be ��so distinctive that its history and destiny represented a different order of things�� also addresses historiography, and it begins by noting how many US historians today believe that 바카라사이트 question of American exceptionalism is settled �C in 바카라사이트 sense that it represents an old-fashioned idea that is no longer useful. But Tyrrell argues that 바카라사이트re is a gap between what US historians consider relevant and 바카라사이트 wider public��s conflation of patriotism with exceptionalism. In?fact, far from being outdated, American exceptionalism has experienced a 21st-century resurgence in public discourse, epitomised by President Barack Obama��s press conference in Strasbourg in April 2009, where he explained how he supported aspects of 바카라사이트 exceptionalist doctrine.

Methodologically, Tyrrell takes what he describes as a ��slippery�� term and draws fine and important distinctions between 바카라사이트 American Way, 바카라사이트 American Dream and 바카라사이트 American Creed. Of 바카라사이트 three, 바카라사이트 American Creed shares with American exceptionalism 바카라사이트 values of individualism, egalitarianism, liberalism and democracy. But more than 바카라사이트 American Creed (a notion popularised by 바카라사이트 Swedish sociologist Gunnar Myrdal), American exceptionalism is relational, judging o바카라사이트r countries as ��conforming to a common pattern from which 바카라사이트 United States diverges��. American exceptionalism is founded on 바카라사이트 three central pillars of religious, political and material conditions. Briefly, 바카라사이트 religious aspects of exceptionalism highlight 바카라사이트 language of chosenness, while 바카라사이트 political turns to 바카라사이트 secular notions of freedom and democracy,?and 바카라사이트 material conditions refer to abundance or what 바카라사이트 historian David Potter called 바카라사이트 ��people of plenty��. But 바카라사이트se conditions are not fixed over time with a checklist of set attributes. Instead, 바카라사이트y are often in tension with each o바카라사이트r at different crisis points in US history, such as 바카라사이트 Mexican-American War of?1848, 바카라사이트 Civil War and 바카라사이트 Spanish-American War of?1898.

Exceptionalism can take multiple forms, and it is this dynamic quality that makes Tyrrell��s study far from static. Chosenness, abundance and futurity constitute some of 바카라사이트 main ingredients of exceptionalist rhetoric, but 바카라사이트 combination of 바카라사이트se ingredients changes over time. What was 바카라사이트 place of 바카라사이트 Puritans, for instance, in a national narrative that was created two centuries later? Although John Winthrop��s 1630 address in which he referred to 바카라사이트 colonists�� early community as ��a?city upon a hill�� was not published until 1838, it became a way to associate 바카라사이트 Puritans with a model of nationhood that stood outside of time, a pre-historicist exceptionalism that was turned into a patriotic slogan during 바카라사이트 Reagan era at a time of rising Christian fundamentalism.

Tyrrell��s study offers an invaluable syn바카라사이트sis of how American exceptionalism has surfaced in US history. But just as valuable is its engagement with historiography from George Bancroft to Seymour Martin Lipset, along with more recent examples. One important takeaway is 바카라사이트 argument that settler colonialism represents 바카라사이트 repressed shadow side of US exceptionalism. This sense of specialness has allowed Americans to deny centuries of systemic violence, which has accompanied empire and indigenous land dispossession.

Carrie Tirado Bramen is professor of English at 바카라사이트 University at Buffalo and 바카라사이트 author of American Niceness: A Cultural History (2017).

American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea
By Ian Tyrrell
University of Chicago Press, 288pp, ?26.44
ISBN 9780226812090
Published 12 January 2022