JUST READ: America, América by Greg Grandin

 

JUST READ: America, América by Greg Grandin

“Who is an American? And what is America?” asks this book in its preface.

Pulitzer Prize winner Greg Grandin has written a history of the United States of America that focuses on how what we now call Latin America has been a pivotal influence on the formation of our place in the world order.

Going back over 500 years, Grandin makes a strong argument that many of the ideals that we assume as intrinsic to our idea of what it means to be an “American” were born from our relationship with the land & cultures south of us.

Also from the preface: “But America, América is more than a history of the Western Hemisphere. It’s a history of the modern world, an inquiry into how centuries of American bloodshed and diplomacy didn’t just shape the political identities of the United States and Latin America but also gave rise to global governance — the liberal international order that today, many believe, is in terminal crisis.”

Grandin has crafted a compelling narrative that contextualizes our current moment. It’s actually scary to me how many parallels he draws between now and what has happened (often many times over) over the past few centuries.

History rhymes, in a mulitlingual chorus that only the ignorant (willful or not) can ignore.

Get America, América here: https://a.co/d/0eIcxh83