‘The past is never dead. It is not even past’. Nobody caught the degree to which contemporary America is shaped by its history better than southern Nobel Prize winning writer William Faulkner. As we approach the 58th presidential elections in the United States, as we get a daily dose of religion, racism, angry rhetoric, political stagnation but also lofty views of how great America really could be or should be, it is not only helpful but necessary to put the identity of America 2016 in historical context. Frans Verhagen will discuss recurrent features in American history that determine that identity.
About Frans Verhagen
Mr.dr. Frans Verhagen MIA studied law and sociology in Groningen and International Relations in New York. He worked as a foreign correspondent in Washington DC, founded and ran a quarterly about the United States and has been studying, writing and providing analysis on radio and tv about the United States for close to forty years. He wrote thirteen books, including a history of American immigration and integration (2005), a short biography of then candidate Barack Obama (2008) and a much lauded biography of Abraham Lincoln (2013). His most recent book is Founding Fathers, which appeared last summer.