Defining Americans
Subtitle: the presidency and national identity
By: Mary E. Stuckey.
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Published: 2004
Place of publication: Lawrence
Language: eng
Number of pages: 413
Subjects: Group identity -- United States -- History.; Political culture -- United States -- History.; National characteristics, American.; Presidents -- United States -- History.
Description: "As Mary Stuckey observes, presidents embrace, articulate, and reinvigorate our sense of national identity. They define who Americans are - often by declaring who they aren't. In this book, she shows how presidential speech has served to broaden the American political community over the past two centuries while at the same time excluding others." "Ambitious and sweeping, Stuckey's work documents the tactics that have naturalized and legitimated inclusion and exclusion, tracing the progress of groups such as women and African Americans from political invisibility to partial visibility and eventual inclusion. She also shows how the terms of inclusion have varied with changing political winds, helping us understand how depictions of the powerless by the powerful reflect and influence the status of various groups."--BOOK JACKET.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.