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Review
| Western Civilization in World History, by Peter N. Stearns, New York: Routledge, 2003. 138 pages. $17.95, paper.
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| Peter N. Stearns's Western Civilization in World History is a recent addition to Routledge's "Themes in World History" series, edited by Stearns himself, and intended to provide a new kind of supplement for courses in world history consisting of individually focused treatments covering a single, important theme over a long time period in a way that will be highly accessible to teachers and students. Stearns has taught western civilization and world history for decades and has published widely on both, including Experiencing World History (2000). In this new book, Stearns provides both the university-level teacher and student a usable framework for thinking about western civilization in a world history context. Additionally, the book allows the reader to identify influences and connections not generally recognized or addressed by those writing textbooks and teaching these survey courses. It is a serious, if brief, discussion of issues that act as a necessary supplement to the general textbook coverage used in college curricula for history survey courses. While western civilization and world history focuses are often perceived as mutually exclusive approaches at best and antagonistic routes into historical studies at worst, Western Civilization in World History successfully demonstrates that these two can be linked and provides a tool to see each topic in the context of the other. Stearns states, "We can do better in linking the two subjects than we have in the past" (p. 1). This book certainly helps us do that. |
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The introduction deals primarily with the current debate between proponents of a world history approach and those favoring a western civilization approach, answering questions such as "What is the fuss all about?" and "Why is the discussion bound up with such intense emotions?" In the public debate on the subject, following the attack on the twin towers and Pentagon, on one side many people felt we needed to learn something about the Middle East and Islam, whereas on the other side, particularly among political conservatives worried about the growing and increasingly diverse makeup of the U.S. population, people called for a solid grounding in western values in an effort to integrate new immigrants and future citizens of the nation. The purely academic debate has been much narrower. On the one hand, some academics worry that world history is too impossibly large to deal with in more than a superficial way. Others, specialists in western civilization, worry about losing the richness of their area of study. |
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This book has several large divisions: "The Western Civ Tradition"; "Getting Western Civilization Started"; "The Rise of the West, 1450–1850"; and "The West in the Contemporary World." In them, Stearns provides an excellent and necessary complement to the textbooks used in both world civilization and world history courses. Besides the lively narrative, Stearns provides an avenue that allows students to probe particular facets of complex issues in world history and western civilization in greater depth than any textbook coverage allows. In the process, a student gains a fuller sense of historians' analytical methods and debates, which is not easily discerned in a textbook discussion. Additionally, because topics are assessed in terms of a range of different societies, the student can compare relevant similarities and differences. Finally, Stearns covers a significant period of time, allowing discussions of change and continuity. |
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The book is certainly aimed at college students but would also be appropriate for AP students. High-school history teachers would also certainly benefit from a careful study of the book because it would provide them much-needed help in moving beyond the dead facts and figures of history. Without abandoning the high-school textbook, they would find in Stearns a lively, integrated, comparative way of studying history that might just engage the students in classroom discussions. Stearns' work is appropriate for a variety of survey courses because the issues involved seem to transcend specific periods or cultures. In just under 138 pages, it is a remarkable feat of compression that also includes a necessary "further reading" section at the conclusion of each chapter and a short, but useful, index at the end of the book. |
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| Brigham Young University |
Richardd Neitzel Holzapfel |
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