Includes bibliographical references (pages 430-493) and index.

A presentation of American history from a multi-cultural perspective, focusing on a broader and comparative approach to enhance the possibility of understanding and appreciating America's racial and cultural diversity. Different mirror -- "Tempest" in the wilderness : the racialization of savagery -- "Giddy multitude" : the hidden origins of slavery -- Toward the stony mountains : from removal to reservation -- No more peck o' corn : slavery and its discontents -- Emigrants from Erin : ethnicity and class within white America -- Foreigners in their native land : manifest destiny in the southwest -- Searching for gold mountain : strangers from a Pacific shore -- "Indian question" : from reservation to reorganization -- Pacific crossings : seeking the land of money trees -- Between "two endless days" : the continuous journey to the promised land -- El Norte : the borderland of Chicano America -- To the promised land : blacks in the urban north -- Through a glass darkly : toward the twenty-first century.