Untitled Document

John P. McKay, Bennett D. Hill and John Buckler. *A History of World Societies*. Fourth Edition, 2 volumes. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996.

World Civilizations courses are staple -- and often soporific -- academic fare for high school and undergraduate university students. Historians face the challenge of writing compelling histories that can sustain the interest of students while at the same time providing generous conceptual frameworks that provoke critical thinking skills. What interpretive angles can historians and educators explore to inspire students in the study of global history? What methods will prove to be stimulating, inclusive and therefore effective? There are several possibilities, one of which comes in historiographic form. A relatively recent and important trend in world history is the attempt to democratize the texts; by this I mean downplaying the textual dominance of western civilization's role in the global history, to allow more room for exploration and appraisal of other world cultures and civilizations.

Providing global parity in text books no small task, however it is encouraging to know that serious attempts are being made to address the conceptual limitations inherent in evaluating global history through a western lens. *A History of World Societies* is a thoughtful and engaging academic corrective to the traditional biases of world history texts. The authors do an admirable, if not perfect, job of bringing multiple cultural, social and political perspectives to the text. They also delineate the importance of cross cultural contact in the narrative, which spans times from the Paleolithic age to the contemporary era, to demonstrate the complex interactive nature of human societies.

In their introduction, the authors describe their methodological approach and goals for the book. They reason that students are apt to identify with and develop an empathetic understanding of ordinary citizens and so they dedicate significant space in the text to culturally diverse social histories. While the authors insist that it is not their aim to diminish the importance of big political, religious, military or economic events, they attempt to enrich the discussion of "big events" by providing a broad socio-political context. For instance they contextualize the impressive rise of the European university system and Gothic cathedrals in the middle ages by reminding their readers that these accomplishments depended on the labor of common people. In an engaging description of peasant society and culture the authors explore such themes as life on the manor, women's role in agricultural production, popular religion, childbirth, health care and disease.

In addition, the authors emphasize their commitment to global balance and attempt to limit their focus on western culture. They examine multiple cultural groups and civilizations -- both as separate entities and interactive societies. An example of cultural diffusion that they evince nicely is the spread of Buddhism from India into China as a byproduct of commercial relationships. This diffusion is unarguably of vast international consequence in both historical and contemporary terms. In several sections of the text they demonstrate how religious expansion and other forms of cultural diffusion often followed commercial and trade routes. The authors do treat non-western societies in a complex and non-ethnocentric way. And while the attempt to provide more space for non-western societies is admirable, the effort falls somewhat short. Nearly half of the 36 chapters have a primarily western focus. However, in fairness to the authors, much of the western emphasis appears in the second volume (1500 to the present) when western expansion had truly global implications.

There are many highlights in the book, such as the authors' use of inclusive language and incorporation of gender analysis into the overall narrative. Women's voices are brought out of the historical shadows and given a respectable amount of attention in this text. Two poems written by Chinese women, excavated from the male dominated literary scene of Chinese antiquity, and an excerpt from the "Declaration of the Rights of Women" by the French feminist, Olympe de Gouges, are just two examples of gender inclusiveness. In the authors' view, the inclusion of primary source materials is an effective way of introducing students to the documents with which historians work. These primary documents, appearing at the end of each chapter under the heading "Listening to the Past," offer a multiplicity of ideas and viewpoints of historic figures. The "Arab view of the Crusades," for example, provides an important counterbalance to the predominantly European recounting of the event.

Each chapter is prefaced by thought-provoking questions, the answers to which the authors strive to elucidate during the chapter. One example of a question designed to help students think in global terms was, "How did the Americas and Australia absorb new peoples, and what was the social impact of the immigrants?" While the narrative is primarily organized along regional, dynastic and later national lines, the authors stress the links and interactions between societies over time. This line of argument refutes the notion that cultural interaction is primarily one-directional. In the case of Africa, they remind the readers that Africans were never isolated from other groups and that in addition to experiencing the impact of other cultures from outside, Africans influenced European, Asian and Middle Eastern societies. It is abundantly clear that Africans, after their forced migration to the new world, also influenced the cultural development of the Americas.

The conquest of the Americas is a multi-layered historical event and the authors bring many important insights into the book. However, the initial description of Spanish domination of the Aztecs and the Incas is misleading. The authors argue, I believe correctly so, that the internal strife within the Aztecs and the Incas, combined with the superior weaponry of the Spanish and wholly different attitudes towards warfare precipitated their crushing defeat. But these factors alone cannot explain such a resounding victory for the Spanish. Historians such as William McNeill and Alfred W. Crosby complicated the dominant theory of Spanish technological advantages in explaining their rapid conquest, by revealing the conquistadors' hidden microbial allies (that decimated large numbers of indigenous people before they ever came into contact with the Spaniards.) It is not that the authors of *A History of World Societies* ignore this critical information-- they later explain that small pox and other epidemics swept through Indian villages, causing a human holocaust-- but the information appears as an afterthought and thus diminishes the importance of disease as one crucial cause of the defeat. Any future edition of the text should weave this micro- organismic information into the initial analysis of the Spanish conquest.

Minor criticisms notwithstanding, I would enthusiastically recommend this text book to teachers of world civilizations courses. The authors are mindful of ethnocentric biases that tend to pervade world civilization texts, and effectively avoid clichés, stereotypes and superficialities in discussing non-western societies. The fourth edition also contains more artwork that visually complements the comprehensive text. A tribute to their academic thoroughness and appreciation of evolving historiographies is their incorporation of new academic findings in this revised edition. For example, 1993 archeological evidence of a three-century-long drought in the northern reaches of the Mesopotamian empire suggests that climatic conditions and not just internal and external political circumstances contributed to the Akkadian decline.

Perhaps most compelling is the authors' commitment to explicating human interconnectedness through time. By exploring human contacts -- and the multiple manifestations of cultural diffusion -- from antiquity to the present, the authors impart the notion of a complex and interrelated historical continuum. In their conclusion, the authors are able to punctuate the argument of their narrative in contemporary terms. While human communities are more connected than ever on a global scale, we are still mired in the largely inequitable social blueprints devised long ago. The authors cogently remind us of the continued lopsidedness of resource distribution and the implications that this has for the human community on an ecological, social and political scale. I like to think that once students are armed with complex historical truths and can relate them to the multiple circumstances of their own lives, that they will envision themselves as agents who can positively shape and redefine the present, and of course, the future. I imagine this is a salient goal of the authors of *A History of World Societies* as well.