A Great Disorder: National Myth and the Battle for America

Written by Richard Slotkin

Narrated by Chris Sorensen

Red America and Blue America are divided with wildly diverging views of why government exists and who counts as American. Their ideologies are grounded in different versions of American history, endorsing irreconcilable visions of patriotism and national identity.



A Great Disorder is a bold, urgent work that helps us make sense of today's culture wars through a brilliant reconsideration of America's foundational myths and their use in contemporary politics. Richard Slotkin identifies five myths, born of different eras, that have shaped our conception of what it means to be American: the myths of the Frontier, the Founding, the Civil War (which he breaks into two opposing camps, Emancipation and the Lost Cause), and the Good War, embodied by the multiethnic platoon fighting for freedom. His argument is that while Trump and his MAGA followers have played up a frontier-inspired hostility to the federal government and rallied around Confederate symbols to champion a racially exclusive definition of American nationality, Blue America, taking its cue from the protest movements of the 1960s, envisions a limitlessly pluralistic country in which the federal government is the ultimate enforcer of rights and opportunities. American history—and the foundations of our democracy—have become a battleground. It is not clear at this time which vision will prevail.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Jun 25, 2024
• ISBN: 9798855544763

Richard Slotkin

Richard Slotkin has been recognized as one of the leading scholars of American cultural history. He has won awards for nonfiction writing on American history, and for historical fiction. His books include Regeneration Through Violence (1973), which won the Albert Beveridge Prize and was a National Book Award Finalist; The Fatal Environment (1985), which won the Little Big Horn Associates Literary Award; and Gunfighter Nation (1992), a National Book Award Finalist. His novel Abe (2000) won the Michael Shaara Prize for Civil War Fiction. He retired in 2008 as Olin Professor of American Studies (Emeritus) at Wesleyan University.