| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 35.1

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| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 35.1 | The History Cooperative

The Human Tradition in California. Edited by Clark Davis and David Igler. No. 14 in the Human Tradition in America Series. (Wilmington, DE: SR Books, 2002. xvii + 253 pp. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index. $65.00, cloth; $19.95, paper.)
The latest in a series of textbooks published by Scholarly Resource Books, The Human Tradition in California is an engaging, thoughtful book. Designed as a course reader, the book includes fifteen mini-biographies of individuals through whose lives the authors explore historical and historiographical, themes. Organized chronologically, the essays are unified around five "critical issues" in California history: national and transnational migration, social and cultural diversity, business and industry, labor, and politics (p. iv).	1
Far from comprising the life histories of a few "great" people, these essays embed both well-known figures (John Steinbeck, César Chávez, Cecil B. DeMille) and "ordinary" people (Pablo Tac, Alfred Doten, Joy Neuenberger) in the broader context of their times. Biography becomes a springboard to a broader analysis that will challenge students to grapple with large historical questions while remaining grounded in the lives of real people. Some of the most engaging essays, such as Miroslava Chávez-García's study of Guadalupe Trujillo, benefit most from the careful integration of biography and analysis.	. . .

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