The ˝Ű×ÓĘÓƵ & Sciences asked faculty members for recommendations on the best books they’ve read on U.S. history, and Georgetown professors of history, government, English, performing arts, psychology and other fields offered their suggestions for readers of all kinds as America commemorates the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

The list of 20 recommended books includes a modern classic novel; a memoir written by an Indigenous spiritual leader; an examination of music in the United States by a music historian; a Pulitzer Prize for History-winning book on Harriet Tubman; and even a book that blends history and psychology about the way American emotional norms have changed over time. 

Read on about the books below, arranged alphabetically by title, to get inspired for your summer reading.

All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake by Tiya Miles

It’s a gorgeous book about an enslaved mother’s love, the tragedy of slavery and the resilience of family. But it is also evidence of how historians bring their feelings and lives to their work, and testament to the irreplaceable importance of museums for preserving American heritage, even that which is troubling or hidden. I’ve assigned this book several times and students love it.

—, professor in the Department of History

American Cool: Constructing a Twentieth-Century Emotional Style by Peter N. Stearns

When I came to the United States as an exchange student from the USSR, I often heard the well-intentioned phrase, “All children smile in the same language.” I wondered whether this could be true, as the Americans I encountered seemed different, especially when it came to emotions. To what extent are emotions universal or shaped by our environment? This book addresses that question and places the seemingly private world of emotions at center stage, tracing the evolution of American emotional norms over time. 

—, associate professor in the Department of Psychology

American Crucible: Race and Nation in the Twentieth Century by Gary Gerstle

Is one defined by one’s “tribe” or by allegiance to a more encompassing national identity? That crucial question of how Americans think of themselves is at the center of Gary Gerstle’s engrossing history, American Crucible (originally published in 2001 and updated in 2017). Starting with Teddy Roosevelt’s presidency and proceeding through the harsh immigration legislation of the 1920s, FDR’s New Deal, the Civil Rights movement, the Reagan era, the rise of multiculturalism and into War on Terror and the Obama presidency, Gerstle explores how our country has contended with two contradictory ideas of itself: a racial nationalism that conceived of America as “a people held together by common blood and skin color and by an inherited fitness for self-government,” versus a far more inclusive “civic nationalism” in which the melting-pot promise of full citizenship is open to all. 

—, the Nicky and Jamie Grant Distinguished Professor of the Practice in Literary Criticism in the Department of English 

America’s Musical Life: A History by Richard Crawford

While primarily focused on American music, the stories in this book offer visceral perspectives on the history of demographic changes, technologies, media and cultural events in the United States. It does this by contextualizing the many musical practices that have developed here. Notably, since the book centers on music, it provides insights into the emotions and expressions that Americans have developed and conveyed throughout history, spanning from the Indigenous population to the close of the 20th century. What sets this book apart is its argument that “American music” is a distinct music, yet it’s a highly varied and continuously evolving set of practices that have sounded through the centuries in unexpected and remarkable ways. 

—, professor of music and chair of the Department of Performing Arts

Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era by James M. McPherson

This is the best single-volume history of the American Civil War, and it illuminates some of the politics that continue to shape our country today. What makes it especially good, in addition to being well-written and fast-paced, is that it integrates so many topics: the politics leading up to and during the war, the military campaigns, the human drama. It is informed by many other historical studies and embodies the best of their insights. McPherson’s talent for storytelling weaves mountains of information together into a fluid narrative.

—, professor and chair in the Department of Government

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

This irreverent 1961 novel about U.S. Army airmen during World War II is both hilarious and a brilliant dissection of the official lies and bureaucratic foolishness intrinsic to every military conflict.

—, professor in the Department of History

Chain-Gang All Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

This dystopian novel is set in the near-future United States, where incarcerated people fight for their freedom in death matches sponsored by the “Criminal Action Penal Entertainment” program, which commercializes and televises gladiator-style contests along with the intimate lives of those on the chains in an accompanying reality TV show. The novel offers a trenchant indictment of the United States’ central paradoxes: its persistent promotion of freedom contrasted with enduring practices of confinement, its celebration of violence in the name of security, and the destruction of Black bodies, which are feared yet commodified for profit and entertainment. 

—, assistant professor in the Department of History

Combee: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom During the Civil War by Edda L. Fields-Black

In prose as beautiful as the landscapes it evokes, Combee recounts how Harriet Tubman grew from an enslaved girl determined to keep her family together on Maryland’s Eastern Shore to a warrior leading a Union Army raid deep into South Carolina during the Civil War. Tubman’s raid furthered Union military aims, achieved the liberation of hundreds of enslaved people and moved the U.S. closer to realizing the aspirational ideals of its founding.

—, professor in the Department of History and director of the Georgetown Institute for Global History

Disabled Upon Arrival: Eugenics, Immigration, and the Construction of Race and Disability by Jay Timothy Dolmage

This is an especially important book to understand our current political moment wherein being a “real American” is regularly invoked as if that category were ever stable. It is also an important read to appreciate how and why disability is central to what it means to be a citizen.

—, Provost’s Distinguished Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy and director of the Disability Studies Program

How the Word Is Passed by Clint Smith

Every nation has an official story, behind which stands the haunting figure of the shadow narrative. In the U.S. that narrative is not found in books and libraries, but inscribed in place names, city maps, monuments and buildings. This book excavates America’s shadow narrative by visiting Monticello, Jefferson’s celebrated home, which doubles as a site of mass enslavement. Angola prison sits on former plantation land, its name borrowed from the African homeland of the people once enslaved there. New York’s African Burial Ground, literally paved over until its rediscovery in 1991, exposes the North’s complicity in the enslavement of Africans. Through these and other stories, Clint Smith retrieves the shadow narrative and brings it into the light.

—, director of the Lannan Center for Poetics and Social Practice

An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

This book offers a powerful and necessary reinterpretation of American history through the experiences of Indigenous peoples, foregrounding issues of colonialism, displacement, resistance and historical memory. As a scholar of justice, peace and memory studies, I appreciate how Dunbar-Ortiz challenges dominant master narratives and encourages readers to confront the historical roots of contemporary inequalities. The book demonstrates how understanding our history requires engaging with multiple perspectives and acknowledging voices that have often been marginalized or excluded from historical accounts.

—, director and teaching professor of the Justice and Peace Studies Program (JUPS)

The Known World by Edward P. Jones

This sprawling 2003 novel tells the story of a community of Black slaveholders in 19th-century Virginia. The book isn’t a work of history, or even a work of historical fiction, traditionally defined, since almost every narrative detail is an invention. But I can’t think of a more powerful account of how history and memory intersect in the American context. On a whim, I assigned Jones’ novel in a seminar this past semester. The whole class was blown away. 

—, professor in the Department of English and Hubert J. Cloke Director of American Studies 

The Metaphysical Club: A Story of Ideas in America by Louis Menand

I first picked up this book as a young journalist in a pre-9/11 world, and have come back to it regularly — as a political beat reporter, as an editor and more often than ever now that I’m back on the Hilltop as a journalism professor. It’s among the best source material I’ve found to help relay the historical and intellectual origins of one of the pillars of traditional news reporting in the United States in the postwar era: the ideal of journalistic objectivity, part and parcel of the continuing challenge of deciding on shared narratives in a polarized society. It’s literary nonfiction and a riveting intellectual history that recounts how the country reinvented itself after the Civil War and developed new ways of thinking about truth, debate and democracy. It’s smart, engaging and just as relevant as ever to many of the questions U.S. reporters — and the news consumers they serve — are still wrestling with today.

—, professor of the practice and director of the Journalism Program

Party Government: American Government in Action by E.E. Schattschneider

Schattschneider was probably the most influential thinker on American political parties. This book, more than a half-century old, goes a long way in explaining why political parties exist, and why we should center them in our understanding of American democracy. Political scientists feel contractually obligated to quote his line on page 1 of Party Government, “that the political parties created democracy and that modern democracy is unthinkable save in terms of the parties.” His writing still resonates, as one Georgetown student said in class, “he’s low-key eating here.”

—, associate professor in the Department of Government

The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. Du Bois and Blues People: Negro Music in White America by LeRoi Jones (Amira Bakara)

These two books, for me, represent the hardships and the hopes of Black people in the U.S. I read both decades ago and re-read every year. W.E.B. Du Bois, a founder of the NAACP and of Pan-Africanism, published The Souls of Black Folk in 1903. He challenges America to live up to its promises and its debt to the descendants of America’s greatest sin — slavery. His famous line was, “the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line.” That rings as true today in the 21st century. Amira Baraka wrote Blues People: Negro Music in White America in 1963. One of the world’s greatest poets, he takes us on a survey: musical, political, historical and social of Black people’s greatest gift to America, and indeed to the world.

—, professor in the Department of History and affiliate professor in the Department of Black Studies and the Department of Performing Arts

Tom Paine and Revolutionary America by Eric Foner

Although this classic biography of the revolution’s most influential anti-monarchical propagandist appeared 50 years ago, it feels timely in this era of “No Kings” agitation. Paine’s “Common Sense” anticipated and shaped the Declaration of Independence, yet his combative style and radically democratic vision led to his marginalization in the new republic. Although few attended Paine’s 1809 funeral, Foner shows how his ideas lived on to inspire future generations to build a more perfect union — work obviously still very much unfinished. 

—, professor in the Department of History and co-director of Georgetown’s Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor (KI)

Unbecoming British: How Revolutionary America Became a Postcolonial Nation by Kariann Akemi Yokota

Although published over a decade ago, it holds enduring value as a reminder of the unique challenge Americans faced upon independence: how to differentiate themselves socially and culturally from the British. As a U.S. diplomatic historian, I frequently use this book to highlight the importance of foreign relations in shaping the United States as a nation. It is exceptionally well-written and engaging, featuring many amusing, insightful anecdotes that demonstrate how 1776 was merely the starting point of a long process of forging a unique national identity in a postcolonial setting.

—, associate professor in the Department of History and School of Foreign Service

Until I Am Free by Keisha N. Blain

This biography of Fannie Lou Hamer demonstrates how ordinary citizens can become extraordinary political leaders. Blain situates Hamer’s activism within broader struggles for voting rights, economic justice and human dignity, offering a powerful account of grassroots democracy in the United States.

—, professor in the Department of Government and the director of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program

The Wind Is My Mother: The Life and Teachings of a Native American Shaman by Bear Heart with Molly Larkin

This is one of my all-time favorite books, not just about U.S. history, but about how to approach life. Born in 1918, the author — Marcellus “Bear Heart” Williams — was one of the last traditionally-trained healers from the Muscogee Creek Nation. He was also a minister in the American Baptist Church. I recommend this book to anyone seeking to understand a portion of U.S. history from the perspective of a Native American healer and to anyone seeking inspiration on how to live a full and complete life with love, compassion and presence.

—, professor in the Department of Computer Science and the McDevitt Chair in Computer Science, Ethics, and Society

Alameddine joined the Department of English’s in 2023 and was previously the Lannan Medical Humanities Scholar-In-Residence in spring of 2023. He won the Lannan Prize for Fiction in 2021. 

The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) is about the 63-year-old Raja and his mother, Zalfa, who live together in a tiny Beirut apartment. Told through the voice of Raja, the book traces the stories of Raja and of his home in Lebanon across six decades.

Alameddine has authored seven novels, one short story collection and one non-fiction book. The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) is his most recent novel and was published in September. His 2014 novel, An Unnecessary Woman, was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction. Alameddine has also received the , the 2025 Bill Whitehead Award for Lifetime Achievement from and the . 

The ˝Ű×ÓĘÓƵ & Sciences talked to Alameddine shortly after he received the National Book Award for Fiction in a New York City ceremony. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

You didn’t study writing at university. How did writing become part of your life?

Reading has always been a part of my life. I’ve been reading as long as I can remember. Before he died, my father reminded me that when I was four, he asked what I wanted to do, and I said, “I want to become a writer.” When I was four, my idea of writing was writing Superman comics and Batman comics, because that’s what I read. So it was always that I read a lot, but I didn’t start writing ’till relatively late in life.

I started writing because I didn’t like what I was reading. The first book was about the AIDS crisis and the Lebanese civil war. We were in the midst of the AIDS crisis, and I did not like how it was being represented, so I sat down and wrote what I saw, and that book [Koolaids: The Art of War] got published.

Have your motivations for writing changed over time?

I always think I write for revenge, which is a very good thing to do. There was an interview with me in a magazine, maybe four or five years ago, and they put one thing that I said on Instagram or Facebook or something. And I don’t hang out that much there, but somebody pointed it out to me, and it said that I still write because I want all the kids who didn’t invite me to their parties in kindergarten to go, “Oh, my God, we should have invited him to that.” I want everybody to regret not being my boyfriend. I want everybody to regret not inviting me to the great parties. And I hate parties, but I want to be invited.

So that’s always the joke in the back of my head, it’s revenge. But primarily I still write because I want to see the books I don’t see, which is a good thing, because nobody else can do it but me. I don’t see the books that I think should be out there, so I write them. It doesn’t mean that they’re better or anything. It’s just a different kind of book.

A lot of people have mentioned the unique voice of Raja. How did his voice develop? 

That’s a difficult question, because it’s important to realize that I don’t believe you develop a voice. It’s there. You just unearth it. A lot of writing classes will tell you, “Find your voice.” And I consider that bull—-. Your voice is always there. You’ve never lost it.

The lovely thing about Raja and why I like it is because, in certain segments of the novel, Raja is just sitting and telling a story. And if the story is good, it tells itself. There are things that I did that take it beyond that. But this interview is not a discussion on how you structure it. The second section, that’s pure storytelling. Somebody sitting on a comfortable sofa and telling the story, saying, “And let me tell you what happened here, and let me tell you what happened there.” So that’s sort of the voice. 

So, if you want to say the voice is what matters, the voice is just somebody telling a story, somebody with a sense of humor. And, you know, again, for me, what makes Raja charming is that he has a sense of humor. And it’s his self deprecating kind of humor. He makes fun of himself, he makes fun of his mother. He makes fun of everything. 

Could you talk about Raja’s relationship with the city of Beirut?

Beirut is important. But every novel, if it’s any good, the setting is important. His relationship to the city is the same sort of relationship that one has with something that is capricious. It offers great solace, and at the same time, it can offer destruction. And so that when you have a capricious God or a capricious city, the relationship becomes in some ways unstable. 

I think part of the problem with this country is that everything seems to be predictable, that we forget that life is not predictable. In Beirut, you don’t know if the electricity is going to come on or never come on. You go out, you don’t know if the traffic light is going to work or not. Whereas when you live, say, in Germany or in parts of the United States, where everything is predictable, then you forget that sometimes you get a monsoon, sometimes you get an earthquake. We don’t seem to be prepared for the randomness of life.

What has your experience been of writing about the unexpected in a culture that prioritizes writing about the everyday, the mundane, the predictable? 

I’ve always felt like an outsider, whether I was writing or not. My writing has always felt like outsider writing. That does not mean that I was not respected or appreciated, but for the most part, I don’t really represent the dominant culture. Particularly when I first started, my first book was relatively shocking. It took a long time for other people to come in, and other writers, to begin to see the world the way that I do. But that’s normal. If you are to start writing, you will write what you see. 

What’s important to know, I came from a background where I grew up in a civil war. Then I went through the AIDS epidemic, where I lost so many friends. I started a gay soccer team, half of them died within three years. Half of them, we’re talking like 40. So there were 20 people who died. So I know that I cannot rely on anything, and still I do. It comforts me to know that when I press this button, the computer comes on. 

So I started believing that, you know, everything will turn out the way I expect it to. But there’s a part of me that knows, and this is what I write about, that knows that, no, this is not it. So it has to do with how one grows up. When I get too comfortable, I start getting depressed without knowing why. Usually it’s because I’m in my head, and I’m at home all the time. So I start thinking, “Oh, my troubles are like the biggest thing.” But it’s important I put myself in situations where I remind myself that life is not predictable. It’s not always calm and collected.

In the book, there’s a lot of tragedy. What is the role of art in times of tragedy?

Let’s just say, this is a question that cannot be answered. There are many, many roles for art. One of them is entertainment, distraction. The other is being a witness, just recording and witnessing what is happening. And there are some that will tell you that it’s about inspiring. Literature, books have many, many purposes, and different readers use it for different things. 

What is the purpose of literature? We’ve been arguing that for generations. It’s like, was Shakespeare trying to create art, or was he just trying to entertain and make a living? And did his work inspire people to do something that they weren’t? It’s a long question. 

Usually, when I’m sitting down to write, it’s about making a sentence work. It’s about moving from one thing to the next and finally, getting a book. I don’t think in terms of, I am writing to do this or that. Once a book is done, once a play is written, once a movie is done, what happens is between the reader and the book. I don’t know what the purpose of writing is. 

In a quote commonly attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt, she said the purpose of life is to live it. So you can say the purpose of art is to make it. The purpose of literature is to write it. Everything else is secondary.

(Photo of Rabih Alameddine by Oliver Wasow)