The "new western history" movement emerged among professional historians in the 1980s, a belated manifestation of the 1970s "

new social history Social history, often called the new social history, is a field of history that looks at the lived experience of the past. In its "golden age" it was a major growth field in the 1960s and 1970s among scholars, and still is well represented in his ...

" movement. The new western historians recast the study of

American frontier The American frontier, also known as the Old West or the Wild West, encompasses the geography, history, folklore, and culture associated with the forward wave of American expansion in mainland North America that began with European colonial ...

history by focusing on race, class, gender, and environment in the trans-Mississippi West. The movement is best known through the work of Patricia Nelson Limerick, Richard White,

William Cronon William Cronon (born September 11, 1954 in New Haven, Connecticut) is an environmental historian and the Frederick Jackson Turner and Vilas Research Professor of History, Geography, and Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madi ...

, and

Donald Worster Donald Worster (born 1941) is an American environmental historian who was, until his retirement, the Hall Distinguished Professor of American History at the University of Kansas. He is one of the founders of, and leading figures in, the field of ...

. The philosophy and historiography of the new western historians is discussed thoroughly and supportively in Patricia Nelson Limerick, Clyde Milner II, and Charles E. Rankin, eds., '' Trails: Toward A New Western History''. An overview of the New Western History is available in Clyde Milner, et al., '' The Oxford History of the American West''. The movement has been thoroughly critiqued by historian Michael Allen. Like the new social historians, new western historians made important contributions. By focusing on race, class, gender, environment, they added to the work of older

Border Borders are usually defined as geographical boundaries, imposed either by features such as oceans and terrain, or by political entities such as governments, sovereign states, federated states, and other subnational entities. Political borders ca ...

lands scholars of Hispanic studies, furthered the understanding of

Native Americans in the United States Native Americans, also known as American Indians, First Americans, Indigenous Americans, and other terms, are the Indigenous peoples of the mainland United States ( Indigenous peoples of Hawaii, Alaska and territories of the United States ...

and frontier women, and worked the fertile ground of twentieth-century western history. Frontier history did not show the impact of the new social history until over a decade after most other historical fields. The reason for the lag is that frontier history, from its inception in

Frederick Jackson Turner Frederick Jackson Turner (November 14, 1861 – March 14, 1932) was an American historian during the early 20th century, based at the University of Wisconsin until 1910, and then Harvard University. He was known primarily for his frontier thes ...

’s 1893 " Frontier Thesis" paper, had always been home to a strong school of non-Marxist economic determinists (“Progressives”). These “old” western historians had addressed multiethnic and environmental issues on the Colonial, trans-Appalachian, and trans-Mississippi frontiers. Although they left much work undone, these Progressives planted the fields the new western historians later harvested.

References and further reading

* Allen , Michael. , "The ‘New’ Western History Stillborn," '' The Historian'' 57 (Fall 1994), 201-208 and "Cowboyphobia, or The Emperors Wear No Duds," '' Journal of the West'' 36 (October 1997), 3-6. * Bernstein, Richard. "Unsettling the Old West," ''

New York Times Magazine ''The New York Times Magazine'' is an American Sunday magazine supplement included with the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times''. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted many notable contributors. ...

March 18, 1990. https://www.nytimes.com/1990/03/18/magazine/unsettling-the-old-west.html?pagewanted=all * Limerick, Patricia Nelson. Clyde Milner II, and Charles E. Rankin, eds., ''Trails: Toward A New Western History'' (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1991). * Massip, Nathalie. "When Western History Tried to Reinvent Itself: Revisionism, Controversy, and the Reception of the New Western History." ''Western Historical Quarterly'' (Spring 2021) 52#1 pp 59-85. * White, Richard ''It's Your Misfortune and None of My Own: A New History of the American West'' (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991). {{ISBN, 0-8061-2366-4 1980s introductions Historiography of the United States History of the American West