Election 2008 made American history, but it was also the product of American history. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Sarah Palin smashed through some of the most enduring barriers to high political office, but their exceptional candidacies did not come out of nowhere. In these timely and accessible essays, a distinguished group of historians explores how the candidates both challenged and reinforced historic stereotypes of race and sex while echoing familiar themes in American politics and exploiting new digital technologies.

Contributors include Kathryn Kish Sklar on Clinton's gender masquerade; Tiffany Ruby Patterson on the politics of black anger; Mitch Kachun on Michelle Obama and stereotypes about black women's bodies; Glenda E. Gilmore on black women's century of effort to expand political opportunities for African Americans; Tera W. Hunter on the lost legacy of Shirley Chisholm; Susan M. Hartmann on why the U.S. has not yet followed western democracies in electing a female head of state; Melanie Gustafson on Palin and the political traditions of the American West; Ronald Formisano on the populist resurgence in 2008; Paula Baker on how digital technologies threaten the secret ballot; Catherine E. Rymph on Palin's distinctive brand of political feminism; and Elisabeth I. Perry on the new look of American leadership.

| Cover Copyright Page Contents Acknowledgments Introduction: Taking the Long View of Election 2008 Part I. Representations: Is Hillary Man Enough? Is Barack Black Enough? Is Michelle the New Jacqueli 1. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the Race Question, and the "Masculine Mystique" 2. Barack Obama and the Politics of Anger 3. Michelle Obama, the Media Circus, and America's Racial Obsession Part II. Historical Precedents, or How Election 2008 Began before the Civil War 4. The 2008 Election, Black Women's Politics, and the Long Civil Rights Movement 5. The Forgotten Legacy of Shirley Chisholm: Race versus Gender in the 2008 Democratic Primaries 6. Hillary Clinton's Candidacy in Historical and Global Context 7. Defining a Maverick: Putting Palin in the Context of Western Women's Political History 8. Populist Currents in the 2008 Presidential Campaign Part III. Legacies: Democracy Undermined? Feminism Redefined? 9. Obaba 2.0: Farewell to the Federal Campaign Finance System and the Secret Ballot? 10. Political Feminism and the Problem of Sarah Palin Conclusion: The Difference that "Difference" Makes Historical Timeline Contributors Index Back Cover | "Time will tell whether the presidential campaign of 2008 constituted what political scientists call a critical election in US history, but there is no question that it changed the game for women and African Americans in politics. . . . Recommended."—Choice
"These essays make a compelling case that the groundbreaking 2008 election was simply one chapter in a long and complicated history of race and gender politics in the United States."—The Journal of Southern History
"This readable collection brings together a distinguished group of scholars to offer reflections that place the galvanizing candidacies of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Sarah Palin in historical perspective." —Eileen Boris, coeditor of Intimate Labors: Cultures, Technologies, and the Politics of Care
|Liette Gidlow is an associate professor of history at Wayne State University and the author of The Big Vote: Gender, Consumer Culture, and the Politics of Exclusion, 1890s-1920s.