This is becoming a trend, but here is an update on what I am reading this week for class.

I am not fond of Atlantic Crossings. Both in style and content, I find it lacking. The connection between European and American progressive ideas is, as Rodgers himself admits, not unknown and no historian would question connectivity between the U.S. and Europe. However, he seems, to me at least, to play to personal interactions when discussing this inter-connectivity, but resort to functionalist explanations when discussing how progressive policies were formed once "imported." He gives little attention to anything "homegrown." Such might harm his interpretive framework and threaten his thesis (that the U.S. went through a period in which it relied on the Atlantic connection and that the period saw progressivism's growth).

I also felt that his habit of assuming his thesis in many of the sections and introductory paragraphs to those sections was poor writing. The thesis is proven in the work, not assumed throughout (IMO).

I hope that someone can tell me why this book is better than I felt. I know it received praise, but why is that so. The reviews only seem to be self-congratulations by transatlantic/transnational historians eager to promote their field.