In Our Image
America's Empire in the Philippines
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4.4 • 14 Ratings
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- $4.99
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- $4.99
Publisher Description
“A brilliant, coherent social and political overview spanning three turbulent centuries.”—San Francisco Chronicle
Stanley Karnow won the Pulitzer Prize for this account of America’s imperial experience in the Philippines. In a swiftly paced, brilliantly vivid narrative, Karnow focuses on the relationship that has existed between the two nations since the United States acquired the country from Spain in 1898, examining how we have sought to remake the Philippines “in our image,” an experiment marked from the outset by blundering, ignorance, and mutual misunderstanding.
“Stanley Karnow has written the ultimate book—brilliant, panoramic, engrossing—about American behavior overseas in the twentieth century.”—The Boston Sunday Globe
“A page-turning story and authoritative history.”—The New York Times
“Perhaps the best journalist writing on Asian affairs.”—Newsweek
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Though Karnow claims that U.S. imperialism in its former colony, the Philippines, has been ``uniquely benign'' compared to European colonialism, the evidence set forth in this colorful, briskly readable history undercuts that prognosis. He shows that a succession of U.S. presidents and administrators coddled the archipelago's 60 or so ruling families, perpetuating the feudal oligarchy that continues to this day, and widening the gap between rich and poor. Karnow, whose Vietnam: A History is a standard account of the American venture in Southeast Asia, draws intriguing parallels: the U.S.-Philippine war of 1898, much like the Vietnam experience, dehumanized U.S. troops, who looted and annihilated villages; ex-President Marcos, like South Vietnamese ruler Diem, presented Washington with the problem of how to deal with a client state that squandered its credibility. In Karnow's assessment, the ``new prosperity'' under Corazon Aquino has not touched the Filipino countryside or slums. Photos. Author tour.
Customer Reviews
A fitting read for us even in 2021.
Since I lived in Makati from 1966 to 1971, I’ve read a lot of material about the Philippines, from puff pieces to serious political criticism. Civil disorder was the reason much of the last quarter of our senior school year was called off. I was home from college, watching TV, half asleep, when the Plaza Miranda bombing occurred. I was home in Louisiana with my husband and two small children when we saw Aquino assassinated.
Mr. Karnow brings all of these memories - and the reasons for them - back in startling detail. This book is an incredibly detailed account of Philippine/American relations that might make a few people nervous. And that’s a good thing. I would highly recommend this book to political science majors, political, and mass communication students. And of course, every member of the US Congress.