Unit 1 | The Forging of the Union
How did a collection of diverse colonies become a single nation, and why did that nation eventually tear itself apart?
Chapter 1 | Roots of the Republic
Chapter 2 | The Early Republic (1789–1840)
Chapter 3 | The Great Divide
Chapter 4 | The Civil War
Unit 2 | Expansion and Exclusion
How did the United States rebuild itself after the Civil War, and why were so many groups systematically excluded from the promises of this new era?
Chapter 5 | The Broken South
Chapter 6 | The Contested West
Chapter 7 | Separate and Unequal
Unit 3 | Industrialization and Reform
Does the government have a duty to protect its citizens from the power of big business, and how did Americans respond to the rapid transformation of their society?
Chapter 8 | The Rise of Industry
Chapter 9 | Immigration and Urbanization
Chapter 10 | The Progressive Era
Unit 4 | The Projection of Power
Why did the United States abandon its policy of isolation to become a global power, and what were the costs of this new role?
Chapter 11 | The American Empire
Chapter 12 | The Great War
Unit 5 | Boom, Bust, & War
How does a nation survive when its economy collapses and the world goes to war?
Chapter 13 | A Culture on Edge
Chapter 14 | The Great Depression and the New Deal
Chapter 15 | World War II Abroad
Chapter 16 | World War II at Home
Unit 6 | The Postwar Order and the Politics of Protest
How did the global fear of communism and the internal explosion of new cultural and social movements fundamentally redefine the American experience?
Chapter 17 | The Cold War & Affluent Society
Chapter 18 | Breaking Jim Crow
Chapter 19 | Sixties & Cultural Revolution
Unit 7 | The Age of Limits and the Global Era
How did the United States navigate the crisis of confidence in the 1970s to emerge as the sole global superpower, and how has the nation adapted to the challenges of a digital, globalized world?
Chapter 20 | An Age of Limits (1969–1980)
Chapter 21 | Morning in America
Chapter 22 | Bridge to 21st Century
Chapter 23 | A New Century