Talk:Richard Hofstadter/Draft

Much of the text and all of the bibliography is by RJensen/Richard Jensen. Richard Jensen 18:34, 8 June 2007 (CDT)

His The American Political Tradition and Men Who Made It was one of the books I used for the Calhoun research paper. :-) Yi Zhe Wu 18:54, 8 June 2007 (CDT)

I used to assign that book in political history courses. it isso insightful and well-written that it works very well. I met Hofstadter just before he died in 1970. On the other hand I don't much like his other books. Richard Jensen 20:26, 8 June 2007 (CDT)

Thanks, that's cool. But I saw American Heritage said "Age of Reform" was his best book that won him the prize. Is that a good book? Yi Zhe Wu 20:32, 8 June 2007 (CDT)

lots of people liked it but not me. It's rarely cited anymore. I was part of the behavioral revolution that demanded much better evidence than he used. He laid out theoreies (like status revolution) without trying to find evidence. That was H's weakness. he never looked at statistics or newspapers, for example. Richard Jensen 00:03, 9 June 2007 (CDT)

This article appears to be ready for approval. Other online articles are lengthier, but this seems to cover the essentials. I'm going to nominate it. Roger Lohmann 16:17, 17 September 2008 (CDT)

Approval Version 1.0

Congratulations again Richard and Roger for Version 1.0 approval. D. Matt Innis 09:05, 22 September 2008 (CDT)

Version 1.1

A number of small changes have been made (by Russell) and a few edits are being made by me) to this article and I intend to submit the Revised version for approval very soon. E.g., It escaped my notice last time, but I am very skeptical that a work by an EX-communist using a biological metaphor popularized by, among others, Thomas Huxley and the sociologist Herbert Spencer and relatively few Marxian concepts is properly termed a "Marxist" work.

I agree. Thanks for the catch and the nomination. Russell D. Jones 16:13, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

As you probably noticed, I made a redlink of "Paranoid Style", which is actually referenced by a fair number of articles and deserves its own article. I haven't read "Anti-intellectualism" recently, but I'll see if I can find an online copy. Once I get even a stub for Paranoid Style, hopefully I'll get Related Articles filled in quickly, and you may want to add more that shows Hofstadter's influence on current American politics.

I'll be happy to join in nominating. Howard C. Berkowitz 16:39, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

I've made a bunch of very small word changes, and rewrote the first and last sentences in particular. (removing what was a very short, one sentence section. I'm not quite sure how revisions work, so I'll check first with Matt, but unless there are any further revisions of my revisions, or either of you want to add/change anything further, this one may be ready for approval now. Roger Lohmann 17:33, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

OK, started The Paranoid Style in American Politics.

Question for Roger, not so much on changes in the article but curiosity on an edit note. You said Social Darwinism was Darwinist, not Marxist, with which I agree. Darwin, though, was a biologist. Are Huxley and Spencer, then, the missing links who applied Darwinism to social systems?

Ah, nostalgia. My 9th grade Honors History teacher was a demoness for term papers, and it was always a lottery who would get "Social Darwinism in American Thought". I didn't bother, and took Alexander Kerensky. --Howard C. Berkowitz 18:03, 5 June 2010 (UTC)