1968 On the edge of world revolution

Description

It was a year of seismic social and political change. With the wildfire of uprisings and revolutions that shook governments and halted economies in 1968, the world would never be the same again. A fierce global community of restless students, workers, women, and national liberation movements arose with radically democratic instincts that audaciously challenged war, capitalism, colonialism, and patriarchy. Still today, 1968 has become a powerful myth that lingers in our memory.

Released for the fiftieth anniversary of that momentous year, Philipp Gassert and Martin Klimke’s seminal 1968 presents an extremely wide ranging survey across the world. Short chapters, written by local eye-witnesses and historical experts, cover the tectonic events in thirty-nine countries across the Americas, Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa, and the Middle East to give a truly global view. Included are forty photographs throughout the book that illustrate the drama of events described in each chapter. This edition also has the transcript of a panel discussion organized for the fortieth anniversary of 1968 with eyewitnesses Norman Birnbaum, Patty Lee Parmalee, and Tom Hayden.

Visually engaging and comprehensive, this new edition is an extremely accessible introduction to a vital moment of global activism in humanity’s history, perfect for a high school or early university textbook, a resource for the general reader, or a starting point for researchers.

Dr. Philipp Gassert is Chair of Contemporary History at the University of Mannheim and formerly a research fellow at the German Historical Institute in Washington, DC. He has previously researched and taught at the German Historical Institute in Washington, DC, at the University of Heidelberg, the LMU Munich, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Augsburg. He is president of the German Society for American Studies. 

Dr. Martin Klimke is the Associate Dean of Humanities and Associate Professor of History at New York University Abu Dhabi. He is an associated faculty member in the Department of History at NYU New York and an associated researcher at the Heidelberg Center for American Studies (HCA) at the University of Heidelberg as well as in Transatlantic Cultural History (TCH) at the University of Augsburg, Germany.