The Cold War and the Color Line: American Race Relations in the Global Arena

Book Description

After World War II the United States faced two preeminent challenges: how to administer its responsibilities abroad as the world's strongest power, and how to manage the rising movement at home for racial justice and civil rights. The effort to contain the growing influence of the Soviet Union resulted in the Cold War, a conflict that emphasized the American commitment to freedom. The absence of that freedom for nonwhite American citizens confronted the nation's leaders with an embarrassing contradiction.

Racial discrimination after 1945 was a foreign as well as a domestic problem. World War II opened the door to both the U.S. civil rights movement and the struggle of Asians and Africans abroad for independence from colonial rule. America's closest allies against the Soviet Union, however, were colonial powers whose interests had to be balanced against those of the emerging independent Third World in a multiracial, anticommunist alliance. At the same time, U.S. racial reform was essential to preserve the domestic consensus needed to sustain the Cold War struggle.

The Cold War and the Color Line is the first comprehensive examination of how the Cold War intersected with the final destruction of global white supremacy. Thomas Borstelmann pays close attention to the two Souths--Southern Africa and the American South--as the primary sites of white authority's last stand. He reveals America's efforts to contain the racial polarization that threatened to unravel the anticommunist western alliance. In so doing, he recasts the history of American race relations in its true international context, one that is meaningful and relevant for our own era of globalization.

Customer Reviews:

Race Relations - A Global Perspective.......2007-04-12

"The Cold War and the Color Line" by Thomas Borstlemann was a textbook in one of my stepson's history classes at Southeastern Louisiana University. He thought I might enjoy it and I did. The focus is on the presidencies of Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson during the U.S. civil rights era. Borstlemann describes how America's practice of racial segregation (and support of European colonial powers, and the segregationist regime in South Africa) hampered it in the minds of third world countries as these mostly non-white countries chose between capitalist and democratic systems and the Communist model. An interesting observation of Bortlesmann's is that the presidents that did the most in support of civil rights for racial minorities were those who grew up in the South--Truman (Missouri) desegregated the military; Johnson (Texas) got the Voting Rights Act passed, and both Carter (Georgia) and Clinton (Arkansas) took a strong interest in the rights of both African-Americans and blacks in Africa. On the other hand, the presidents raised outside the South (Eisenhower in Kansas, Kennedy in Massachusetts, Nixon in California, Reagan in Illinois and Bush in Connecticut) viewed racial equality as a secondary issue at best, or in some cases even worked to reverse past gains. As a "50-something", I lived through most of this era (albeit in central New York state, not the deep South), and found Borstlemann's work to be very illuminating. Since I've lived in the south (South Carolina, Virginia and Louisiana) for the last 30 years, I appreciated the book from the "new South" perspective as well. Highly recommended to students of history and race relations.

The Cold War and Race Relations out of their Vacuums.......2002-07-25

In The Cold War and the Color Line, Borstelmann evaluates how US domestic and international race relations shaped the Cold War and how the Cold war shaped the domestic and international race relations. From my studies, and I imagine the studies of the majority of average Americans, the civil rights movement, de-colonization, and the Cold War happened in individual vacuums - separate from each other, only linked by common abstract dates. Borstelmann shows these happenings are all highly connected - at times acting as catalysts for another. "There was no greater weakness for the United States in waging the Cold War than inequality and discrimination," Borstelmann asserts. The United States had to confront racial segregation and discrimination within its own borders as well as regimes around the world to develop a multiracial global coalition against Soviet Communism. The US had to inspire the newly de-colonized non-white nations to sway towards the "free world." But how was the US to inspire a world, the majority non-white when Jim Crow was still firmly implanted in American society? Borstelmann follows the developments of these issues through the Presidencies that were tempered by the Cold War. I found the book a pleasant surprise. The book went beyond what I expected - being the race situations during the Cold War. Borstelmann took his work beyond that to a living political environment - domestic and international as one - where de-colonization, the Cold war environment, and the Civil Rights movement were taken out of their individual vacuums and thrown into a perspective that understands the complexities of that no so long ago reality. I am positive that anyone interested in race relations will embrace this book. Also I believe for a complete perspective of the Cold War or for any interested in the momentous events that transpired in the 20th century, this well researched book will make an excellent read.

Global Shadows: Africa in the Neoliberal World Order

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Ecellent book

Global Shadows: Africa in the Neoliberal World Order
James Ferguson
Manufacturer: Duke University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

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Neoliberalism as Exception: Mutations in Citizenship and Sovereignty
A Brief History of Neoliberalism
Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection
Fear of Small Numbers: An Essay on the Geography of Anger (Public Planet)
Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global Assemblages

ASIN: 0822337177

Book Description

Both on the continent and off, âAfricaâ is spoken of in terms of crisis: as a place of failure and seemingly insurmountable problems, as a moral challenge to the international community. What, though, is really at stake in discussions about Africa, its problems, and its place in the world? And what should be the response of those scholars who have sought to understand not the âAfricaâ portrayed in broad strokes in journalistic accounts and policy papers but rather specific places and social realities within Africa?

In Global Shadows the renowned anthropologist James Ferguson moves beyond the traditional anthropological focus on local communities to explore more general questions about Africa and its place in the contemporary world. Ferguson develops his argument through a series of provocative essays which openâas he shows they mustâinto interrogations of globalization, modernity, worldwide inequality, and social justice. He maintains that Africans in a variety of social and geographical locations increasingly seek to make claims of membership within a global community, claims that contest the marginalization that has so far been the principal fruit of âglobalizationâ for Africa. Ferguson contends that such claims demand new understandings of the global, centered less on transnational flows and images of unfettered connection than on the social relations that selectively constitute global society and on the rights and obligations that characterize it.

Ferguson points out that anthropologists and others who have refused the category of Africa as empirically problematic have, in their devotion to particularity, allowed themselves to remain bystanders in the broader conversations about Africa. In Global Shadows, he urges fellow scholars into the arena, encouraging them to find a way to speak beyond the academy about Africa’s position within an egregiously imbalanced world order.

Customer Reviews:

Ecellent book.......2007-04-04

I love this book
Writing style is amazing and the information is inspiring
I recommend this book 100%

Shea Butter Republic: State Power, Global Markets, and the Making of an Indigenous Commodity

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Shea Butter Republic: State Power, Global Markets, and the Making of an Indigenous Commodity
Brenda Chalfin
Manufacturer: Routledge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Fear of Small Numbers: An Essay on the Geography of Anger (Public Planet)
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Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power: Race and the Intimate in Colonial Rule

ASIN: 0415944619

Book Description

Indigenous to the savanna zone in West Africa, shea (butyrospermin parkii) has been produced and sold by rural women and circulated on the world market as a low-priced and little-known raw material for more than a century. Locally, shea butter is used for cooking, making soap, leatherworking, dying, and as a medical and beauty aid. Globally, it has been used in producing soaps, candles, margarine, and most significantly, as a substitute for cocoa butter in chocolate production. In the past decade, however, shea has come to occupy a new position at the cutting edge of global capitalism. Now sold in exclusive shops as a high-priced cosmetic and medicinal product, it caters to the desire of cosmopolitan customers worldwide for luxury and exotic self-indulgence.
This ethnographic study traces shea from a pre- to post-industrial commodity to provide a deeper understanding of emerging trends in tropical commoditization, cosmopolitan consumption, global economic restructuring and rural livelihoods. Chalfinchallenges the widely held assumption that globalization makes state institutions and authority unnecessary and also undercuts the neo-liberal argument that streamlining state operations yields greater efficiency and accountability. Also inlcludes seven maps.

Reproductive Rights in a Global Context: South Africa, Uganda, Peru, Denmark, the United States, Vietnam, Jordan

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Reproductive Rights in a Global Context: South Africa, Uganda, Peru, Denmark, the United States, Vietnam, Jordan
Lara M. Knudsen
Manufacturer: Vanderbilt University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Women's Studies | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Abortion & Birth Control | Women's Studies | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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Human Rights | Constitutional Law | Law | Subjects | Books

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Women's Activism and Globalization: Linking Local Struggles and Transnational Politics

ASIN: 0826515282

Book Description

Traveling alone when she was between 17 and 22, with no institutional affiliation and no financial assistance, the author visited five developing countries and two developed ones on five continents. Her goal was to extend her own experience in an abortion clinic in Portland, Oregon. Lara Knudsen interviewed over 90 women's rights activists, health professionals, NGO workers, and government officials, gaining a sense of both official policies and the actual delivery of services in local clinics. The book places the experiences of women within the global context of how international population control agendas have influenced women's reproductive rights in the past, and how the changing international discourse on reproductive health continues to influence those rights today.

Beyond the 'African Tragedy': Discourses on Development And the Global Economy

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Beyond the 'African Tragedy': Discourses on Development And the Global Economy

Manufacturer: Ashgate Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Policy & Current Events | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Development & Growth | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Economic Policy & Development | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0754648249

The Global Tourism System: Governance, Development And Lessons from South Africa (New Directions in Tourism Analysis)

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The Global Tourism System: Governance, Development And Lessons from South Africa (New Directions in Tourism Analysis)
Scarlett Cornelissen
Manufacturer: Ashgate Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Hospitality, Travel & Tourism | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 075464250X

Global Dimensions of the African Diaspora

Average customer rating:

Thought -stimulating reading
CLARITY

Global Dimensions of the African Diaspora

Manufacturer: Howard University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | World | History | Subjects | Books

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The African Diaspora: African Origins and New World Identities
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Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal

ASIN: 088258149X

Customer Reviews:

Thought -stimulating reading.......2007-02-12

The information contained within this text is thought-stimulating, thereby encouraging the reader to further research the specific area of his or her personal interest regarding the African Diaspora by providing a helpful selected bibliography, footnotes and endontes pertinent to each essay, as well as as an useful overall index.

CLARITY.......2007-02-06

Another excellent read for us Africans by a African who knows his history and not brain washed by His Storyof the intruder.

Speaking Out: Women, War and the Global Economy

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Speaking Out for Others

Speaking Out: Women, War and the Global Economy
Jan Haaken , Ariel Ladum , Seiza de Tarr , Kayt Zundel , and Caleb Heymann
Manufacturer: Ooligan Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

General | Education | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Women's Studies | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Education | Professional & Technical | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 193201005X

Book Description

"Speaking Out" grew from an international peace project addressing issues of war, from personal effects of combat to institutional factors shaping armed conflicts. Drawing on the Sierra Leone civil war, this curriculum bridges local and global, placing gripping personal stories in an international landscape and highlighting creative capacities that survive war. Stories, games and role-playing are interwoven with lessons on colonialism, West African agricultural economy, international banking, diamond and arms trades and peace-building projects. The book includes projects for the classroom and beyond. It provides a method for instruction on war and peace, with options for high school or college use, and will be of interest to scholars in global studies, psychology, sociology, women's studies, communications and conflict resolution.

Customer Reviews:

Speaking Out for Others.......2007-08-09

Jan Haaken has committed her life to educating and helping others with a compassion that few offer in the field. Her research and work has opened a world to those who would not have found a voice. And it has opened a world to those who want to learn more about the world and the people in it. There is no easy look into the lives of women who suffer in Sierra Leone, Africa. Yet it brings each of us closer to understanding what is happening so far removed from our lives. Haaken and the others who worked on the book provide a unique look into the lives of women suffering from war and the effects of the global economy.
While the book is designed for collegiate study, it educates everyone who reads it. The personal testimonies give a poignant account of life that must be addressed. The exercises create an opportunity to think about the affects of a global economy that disregards many in lieu of profits.
Speaking Out is what we each must do after reading this book.

Global Studies: Africa (Global Studies Africa)

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Global Studies: Africa (Global Studies Africa)
Wayne Edge
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill/Dushkin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

African Studies | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

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Understanding Contemporary Africa (Understanding: Introductions to the States & Regions of the Contemporary World)
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Global Studies: Latin America (Global Studies Latin America)
Global Studies: Japan and the Pacific Rim (Global Studies Japan and the Pacific Rim)
Africans and Their History: Second Revised Edition

ASIN: 0073195359

Book Description

Global Studies is a unique series designed to provide comprehensive background information and selected world press articles on the regions and countries of the world. Each Global Studies volume includes an annotated listing of World Wide Web sites. Global Studies titles are supported with study tools and links to related websites at our student website www.dushkin.com/online/.

Music in East Africa: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture (Global Music Series)

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How musical performances interact with local social systems

Music in East Africa: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture (Global Music Series)
Gregory Barz
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Music | Entertainment | Subjects | Books

History & Criticism | Music | Entertainment | Subjects | Books

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Music in Japan: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture (Global Music Series)
Carnival Music in Trinidad: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture (Global Music Series) W/CD

ASIN: 0195141520

Book Description

Music in East Africa is one of several case-study volumes that can be used along with Thinking Musically, the core book in the Global Music Series. Thinking Musically incorporates music from many diverse cultures and establishes the framework for exploring the practice of music around the world. It sets the stage for an array of case-study volumes, each of which focuses on a single area of the world. Each case study uses the contemporary musical situation as a point of departure, covering historical information and traditions as they relate to the present. Visit www.oup.com/us/globalmusic for a list of case studies in the Global Music Series. The website also includes instructional materials to accompany each study. Music in East Africa introduces readers to the various ways in which historical music traditions and present-day musical performances either collide, fuse, or remain mutually exclusive in contemporary East Africa. Through descriptions of performances and case studies that detail the lives of individual musicians, Gregory Barz shows how people in Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania create, dance to, and interact with traditional East African music. Focusing on specific contexts in which music is integrated into the everyday lives of individuals and communities, Music in East Africa considers the significance of music for people as they negotiate the world around them. It looks at the defining principle of musical performance in East Africa--how drumming (and the playing of other musical instruments), singing, dancing, and drama are deeply connected to traditional cultures. The book highlights the importance of individual musicians as specialized members of communities and describes the role of musical performances in such social systems as popular entertainment and religious rituals. It also shows how traditional East African music and performance has responded to modernization, colonization, commercialism, and nationalism. Featuring vivid illustrations and eyewitness accounts of performances, Music in East Africa incorporates numerous activities that encourage readers to engage with the music. The book is packaged with a 70-minute CD containing examples of the music discussed in the text.

Customer Reviews:

How musical performances interact with local social systems.......2004-08-30

Gregory Barz's MUSIC IN EAST AFRICA introduces readers to the historical and modern musical performances unique to East Africa.
Chapters in his MUSIC IN EAST AFRICA select individual musicians working in both traditional and contemporary fusions of sounds.
Add eyewitness accounts of performances and descriptions of how musical performances interact with local social systems and you have a blend of music theory and anthropology unique to this series.

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