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William Hardy McNeill (born October 31, 1917, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) is a world historian. He is among the world's most respected historians and was Professor Emeritus of History at the University of Chicago. He is retired and, since 2006, a widower.

McNeill's most popular work is The Rise of the West. The book explored world history in terms of the effect of different old world civilizations on one another, and especially the dramatic effect of Western civilization on others in the past 500 years. It had a major impact on historical theory, especially its emphasis on cultural fusions, in distinction to Oswald Spengler's view of discrete, independent civilizations.

McNeill's Plagues and Peoples was an important early contribution to the emergence of environmental history as a discipline

McNeill is the son of theologian John T. McNeill and the father of historian, J. R. McNeill.

• (2005). The Pursuit of truth: A Historian's memoir.
• (2003). The Human Web: A Bird's-Eye View of World History (with J. R. McNeill). W. W. Norton & Co Inc. ISBN 0-393-92568-4
• (1998). A World History. Oxford University Press; 4th edition. ISBN 0-19-511616-X
• (1995). Keeping together in time. Dance and Drill in the human history.
• (1991). Hutchins' University. A Memoir of the University of Chicago. 1929-1950. The University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-56170-4
• (1989). Arnold J. Toynbee: A Life . Oxford University Press, Oxford. ISBN 0-19-506335-X
• (1982). The Pursuit of Power: Technology, Armed Force, and Society since A.D. 1000. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-56157-7
• (1980). The Human Condition: An Ecological and Historical View. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey. ISBN 0-691-05317-0
• (1976). Plagues and Peoples. Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc., New York, NY, ISBN 0-385-12122-9.
• (1963). The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community. Chicago.

• The Changing Shape of World History, William H. McNeill, Paper originally presented at the History and Theory World History Conference, March 25-26, 1994.

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