3 Credits 
Professor Strauss
MWF 9:05-9:55 am
Cross-listed with HIST 492 BX

This course explores the international history of the United States from 1960 to the present. By 1960 the United States had already been perceived as a world power for nearly half of what has been popularly called the “American Century.” We will study the extent and the limits of that power and the interplay between foreign relations and internal developments during the final decades of the Cold War and over the two decades since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. We will examine the forces that have shaped U.S. foreign policy as well as the techniques of diplomacy and the kinds of power the United States has deployed in other countries and regions. We will also pay close attention to the increasingly important role of culture in the twentieth century – culture as an instrument of foreign relations and culture as a body of ideas and practices that shape and are re-shaped by foreign relations. In scrutinizing policy statements, presidential addresses, along with poems, short stories, films, paintings, and photography, the course will examine how the United States has understood the world since 1960 and how peoples around the world have understood and experienced U.S. power. Assignments will include four short analytical papers and an oral presentation.

Texts may include:

• Graham Greene. The Quiet American. Penguin Classic, 2004.
• Penny M. Von Eschen. Satchmo Blows Up the World: Jazz Ambassadors Play the Cold War. Harvard, 2006.
• David Ekbladh. The Great American Mission: Modernization and the Construction of an American World Order. Princeton, 2011.
• Bethany Moreton. To Serve God and Wal-Mart: The Making of Christian Free Enterprise. Harvard, 2010.
• Andrew Bacevich. The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism. Holt, 2009.
• Additional articles, video clips, and other excerpts will be available on the course website.