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U.S. History 1877-Present Videos 173 videos
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U.S. History Course Introduction 142 Views
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Description:
Mo' power, mo'money, mo' rights—no this isn't the intro to another of our ingenious rap songs. They're the three main themes in U.S. history.
Transcript
- 00:04
In the beginning all knowledge of American history was [Galaxy in space]
- 00:06
formless and empty and then shmoop created a US history course and there
- 00:12
was lightning except that's not actually hell went down most Americans have been [Young boy walks up to woman reading book]
- 00:15
absorbing versions of American history since they could walk unfortunately a
- 00:19
lot of those versions get pretty darn mangled despite what Disney tells us
Full Transcript
- 00:23
Pocahontas did not fall in love with the John Smith she married a dude named [Pocahontas appears outside castle]
- 00:28
crawl and died of an unknown disease in England not exactly a Disney ending no
- 00:33
is it so let's put Disney aside and start with the broad strokes of what [Paint brush brushes]
- 00:36
American history actually is basically we can break American identity into the
- 00:41
three Mo's no money mol per mol right the three modes are like The Three
- 00:46
Stooges but likely wrong oh okay so we're not created analogies here bear [Three stooges appear]
- 00:50
with us first up no money americans love their dolla dolla bills so it's no
- 00:56
surprise that a big chance of american history is about economic growth even
- 00:59
that whole throwing off the yoke of british imperialism thing was cleaner [Man yoking large containers]
- 01:03
about smashing economic freedom to pursue rampant capitalism without those
- 01:08
pesky brits taxing us and you know get in the way from its revolution onward
- 01:12
the u.s. combined several magical ingredients to achieve crazy economic [Money appears from cooking pot]
- 01:16
growth capitalism of course industrialization and lots of natural
- 01:20
resources which were free and ready to exploit well the story of the US economy
- 01:25
has its upside like the turn of the century millionaires who built the
- 01:28
American infrastructure and the rise of a strong middle class in the 1940s and [Millionaire man appears in a golden robe]
- 01:33
50s but there are also some downsides not everybody got a share of all that
- 01:37
cash like working class families trapped in cycles of poverty or you know slave
- 01:42
okay time for the second mode low-power American history since the Civil War is [Soldiers firing rifles]
- 01:47
also a story about becoming a global power like how the US has political
- 01:51
influence all around the world and how we have an enormous economy rivaled only
- 01:57
by China and how we have at least six hundred military bases overseas in over
- 02:02
a hundred foreign countries well none of that happened overnight or by accident [Boy sleeping on a desk]
- 02:05
America went from a socially fragmented mess in Civil War time
- 02:10
to the most powerful nation in the world today on the one hand it's a good story
- 02:13
about overcoming our internal challenges and rewarding innovation on the other
- 02:17
hand it's a depressing tale of how imperialism and conquest made the u.s. [Man with head in his hand]
- 02:21
the world's most kind of over controlling dad well it looks like the
- 02:25
third Mo's up mo right when our forefathers wrote the Constitution
- 02:29
standing in a grand be wicked circle around the sacred parchment they ended
- 02:33
inequality forever they declared that all men that were created equal and had
- 02:38
the same rights to Liberty justice and the pursuit of happiness except they
- 02:43
wrote it in the 18th century and in the 18th century all men meant all white [Man appears outside house holding arms up]
- 02:48
land owning males with full citizenship which was kind of disappointing to
- 02:52
everyone in the country who was not like female or an immigrant so the third
- 02:56
theme in US history is the battle for truly equal rights for all unfortunately
- 03:00
this battle was filmed in slow motion now that it took a long time and it's [Soldiers marching into battle]
- 03:05
still going on the Civil War saw the end of slavery in the 1860s suffragist got Man jumps over fence]
- 03:11
women the right to vote in 1920 and a hundred years later the civil rights
- 03:15
movement finally ended legal racial segregation in the 1960s the labor [Women voting]
- 03:20
movements and unions uh also did their part for better and for worse they
- 03:24
helped ensure working-class rights like the eight-hour work day laborer safety [Construction workers appear]
- 03:27
minimum wage and the end of child labor with story still being written so well
- 03:32
you know stay tuned mo TV how about that that's our fourth one mo TV yippee [Girl watching TV]
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