Internationalizing American History. A Mexican View

Abstract

Este articulo es un llamamiento a los colegas norteamericanos a prestar mas atencion a los estudios historicos de otros paises. La historiografia norteamericana da la impresion de que en los ultimos aflos se esta voliendo autoreferencial. La autora, quien recibio parte de su formacion academica en los EEUU y que, tambien ha ejercido la docencia en universidades estadounidenses, aboga vivamente por investigaciones en base de estudios comparados como el de Robert Palmer The Age of Democratic Revolution. I found that the three questions posed to the participants are difficult to address separately, but I guess that my interest lies in the first two. The entrance of the New World into history opened the way to globalism, and the foundation of the United States was a new step in that direction. Nevertheless, U. S. history has always been written with secondary attention to the rest of the World, and in particular, to the Western Hemisphere; this, in spite of many events, such as independence and geographical and economic expansion, which have been linked to the republics to the South. Even Canada does not receive proper attention. After many years of experience in living, teaching and lecturing in different parts of the world, I have begun to question strongly the parochialism of U. S. history. The general trend of emphasizing how American ideals and institutions have been successfully advancing from colonial times to the present and insisting on the uniqueness and ex- ceptionalism of the American experience, that was so convincing when