A History of Western Society, Volume 2

by John P. McKay, Clare Haru Crowston, Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks

The past gets real and relevant as you hear the stories of ordinary people in History of Western Society, Volume 2 . Successfully navigate the past by paying close attention to everyday life.

744 pages, Paperback

Published September 7, 2016

Reviews

[Martijn Vsho · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent book about the history of the last 5 centuries of western society. As a person who enjoys the social aspect, I enjoyed his "Life in..." chapters. I also appreciated how the chapters varied on their focus between political, economic, social, and intellectual. These changing foci brought various perspectives to events, ideas, and people.
However, I was disappointed to see such a big focus on the US in a book about Western European society. This bias is no surprise in a book written in America, by Americans. While I understand that Europe has had a profound influence on the US and vice versa, the authors can easily lessen the US details to discuss in greater depth the other countries that have impacted Europe or been impacted by it. Furthermore, the authors have significantly downplayed the importance of religion in Western Europe, although this might be a result of increasing secularization and the impact of the Enlightenment on modern thought.
Overall, I did enjoy this book and will keep it as a reference book.

[Jisca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Contrary to a lot of my classmates, I actually did read this book (at least more than 70% of it).
In my opinion, this was the best coursebook we had this year (first year history bachelor). It had a variety of 'extra little chapters' which helped create a more complete image of the time in question. The lay out was very clear too. Furthermore, it contained lots of images and was well written.