Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: Fathers and Children: Andrew Jackson and the Subjugation of the American Indian by Michael Paul Rogin ISBN: 0-88738-886-8 Publisher: Transaction Pub Pub. Date: April, 1991 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 2 (2 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Andrew Jackson, the Indians, and Psychohistory
Comment: Rogin's book is an amalgamation of biography, history, and psychohistory. As biography, the book discusses the young Andrew Jackson, the trauma he underwent by being a posthumous child, and the death of his mother on the American frontier when he was fourteen. The book then explores Jackson's violent early manhood and his following career as a successful land speculator and local polititican. The book proceeds to examine Jackson's role in the War of 1812 and, most importantly in the Creek and Seminole Indian Wars. It follows this discussion with a treatment of Indian affairs during Jackson's Presidency as well as with a broader, though shorter discussion, of the nature of Jacksonian democracy and of Jackson's destruction of the Second Bank of the United States.
There is some good information and thought in the book. When the book focuses on telling the story of Jackson and his activities, it is good reading and, in the main, does not present an appealing picture of the United States's or Jackson's treatment of the Southeast Indians. Jackson's Indian Wars and subsequent removal policy come in for strong criticism. Rogin has interesting things to say about the conflicted character of American attitudes to the Indians and how these attitudes were both reflected and created by Jackson. It is also interesting to approach Jacksonian democracy from the perspective of Indian affairs. Rogovin's book was among the first to focus on Jackson's Indian policy in an attempt to understand Jacksonian America. Rogovin's judgments both on Jackson and more broadly, on the growth of democracy and industrialization in the United States, seem to me overly harsh.
The book is seriously marred by its attempts at psychohistory. There is a lot of second and third hand reliance on works by Freud, Erickson, Melanie Klien and other founders of psychoanalysis and a lengthy, unconvincing, attempt to apply Rogin's understanding of psychoanalysis to Jackson and to the American experience. It didn't work for me, to say the least. The book's overreliance on questionable psychohistory does lead me to be skeptical about much of the argument and conclusion of the book. The book is good at relating the literature of the day to Jacksonian America with some insightful comments about the work of Herman Melville. (Rogovin has also written a book about Melville).
There is something here worth knowing and saying about Jackson. Our Indian policy was indeed tragic and exacted a great human toll. The book though doesn't appreciate the difficult pressures in foreign and domestic affairs facing a young America. It is overly angry with the United States and too dependent on questionable psychologizing. The book shouldn' be anybody's sole source of information about Jacksonian America or Indian policy.
Rating: 1
Summary: Psychoanalysis of Andrew Jackson?
Comment: This book attempts to explain the democratization of America by means of a Freudian psychological analysis of Andrew Jackson. The author undertakes this task because of his belief that Jackson was such a forceful personality that he became the model for an entire age of Americans. Rogin links Jackson's entire personality, his desire to remove the Indians, and his war on the Second U. S. Bank to a rage born of the dominance of his early years by women. It is entirely Freudian, and entirely naive. If you seek actual historical knowledge, look elsewhere. If you seek psychobabble in its purest, most nonsensical form, this is the book for you.
 |
Title: Subversive Genealogy: The Politics and Art of Herman Melville by Michael Paul Rogin ISBN: 0520051785 Publisher: University of California Press Pub. Date: March, 1985 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
 |
Title: The Great Unraveling: Losing Our Way in the New Century by Paul Krugman ISBN: 0393058506 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: September, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
