Kristin Hogansonová je profesorkou historie, která se zaměřuje na Spojené státy ve světovém kontextu, kultury amerického imperialismu a transnacionální historii. Její práce se ponořuje do složitých vztahů mezi vnitřní a vnější politikou a zkoumá, jak jsou koncepty americké identity a mužnosti utvářeny v globálním měřítku. Prostřednictvím pečlivé analýzy Hogansonová odhaluje, jak se ideály a ambice prolínají s historickými událostmi, a nabízí hluboký pohled na psychiku amerického expanzionismu. Její přístup nabízí čtenářům nové pochopení toho, jak se globální interakce formovaly a jak tyto interakce zpětně formovaly Ameriku.
The narrative explores the often-overlooked aspect of American identity during the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, highlighting how the United States not only sought to expand its influence but also embraced a culture of consumption and cosmopolitanism. Kristin Hoganson argues that between the Civil War and World War I, Americans increasingly indulged in imported goods, reflecting a desire to engage with the world while simultaneously shaping their national identity. This duality challenges the traditional view of America as solely an expansionist power.
When Kristin L. Hoganson arrived in Champaign, Illinois, after teaching at Harvard, studying at Yale, and living in the D.C. metro area with various stints overseas, she expected to find her new home, well, isolated. Even provincial. After all, she had landed in the American heartland, a place where the nation's identity exists in its pristine form. Or so we have been taught to believe. Struck by the gap between reputation and reality, she determined to get to the bottom of history and myth. The deeper she dug into the making of the modern heartland, the wider her story became as she realized that she'd uncovered an unheralded crossroads of people, commerce, and ideas. But the really interesting thing was that over the course of American history, even as the region's connections with the rest of the planet became increasingly dense and intricate, the idea of the rural Midwest as a steadfast heartland became a stronger and more stubbornly immovable myth. In enshrining a symbolic heart, the American people have repressed the kinds of stories that Hoganson tells, of sweeping breadth and depth and soul. In The Heartland, Kristin L. Hoganson drills deep into the center of the country, only to find a global story in the resulting core sample. A provocative and highly original work of historical scholarship, The Heartland speaks volumes about pressing preoccupations, among them identity and community, immigration and trade, and security and global power. And food. To read it is to be inoculated against using the word "heartland" unironically ever again
