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History News Network

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Week of August 5, 2013


Up Front

Where's That Simon & Schuster Edition of The Jefferson Lies David Barton's Been Promising?
Chris Rodda
Ever since Thomas Nelson pulled the book a year ago, Barton's claimed that Simon & Schuster will publish it. So where's the beef?
Tags: David Barton, Jefferson Lies, Simon & Schuster, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Nelson
Revolutionary Disillusionment, from 1789 to 2013
Alyssa Goldstein Sepinwall
Like the French abbot Henri Grégoire, Arab intellectuals are becoming disenchanted with their revolutions.
Tags: Arab Spring, disillusionment, French Revolution, Henri Grégoire
“Them Bad Russians” Still Haunt America
Ira Chernus's MythicAmerica
Obama's canceling of his summit with Putin draws upon a history of scary Russian caricatures.
Tags: Barack Obama, Russia, United States, Vladimir Putin
Why the Arab Spring is Likely to Disappoint Those Who Are Making it Happen
T. Mills Kelly
Bärbel Bohley, a democratic leader in East Germany, saw her movement quickly co-opted at its moment of greatest success.
Tags: East Germany, Bärbel Bohley, 1989, Arab Spring
Revolutions: Three Different Kinds
Rex Wade
Let's not just classify revolutions by their success rate; it also matters if the original revolutionaries survive to the end.
Tags: American Revolution, French Revolution, Russian Revolution, Turkish Revolution
Don't Overestimate the Cohesion of the Military during Revolutionary Moments
Rex Wade
Both the officer corps and the rank-and-file in the Russian Army in 1917 united against the tsar ... but then had a bit of an *ahem* falling out...
Tags: Imperial Russian Army, Russian Revolution, World War I, communism
Serendip-o-matic Seeks to Replicate Thrill of Archival Discovery Online
Michelle Moravec
The Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media's new digital humanities tool allows users to do what historians do in the archives ... only on a bigger scale.
Tags: Center for History and New Media, digital humanities, George Mason University, research

News at Home

George Zimmerman, Harmony Stair, and the Elephant in the Room
Jim Loewen
Racial profiling advocates claim young black men are more likely to be criminals, but ignores the 98 percent of young black men who aren't.
Tags: George Zimmerman, Harmony Stair, race, criminal justice
Richard A. Baker: If You Think the Senate is Dysfunctional Now, Wait Until After the Nuclear Option (INTERVIEW)
David Austin Walsh
The author of The American Senate shares his thoughts on the state of the institution.
Tags: Richard A. Baker, U.S. Senate,
Why the Business Community and the GOP Base are Parting Ways on Immigration
Elizabeth Tandy Shermer
The business and the party base did the same thing over segregation.
Tags: Atlanta, immigration reform, Republican Party, segregation

News Abroad

Bradley Manning Meets Woodrow Wilson
Ira Chernus's MythicAmerica
The secret of the 1917 Espionage Act revealed.
Tags: Bradley Manning, WikiLeaks, Woodrow Wilson, Espionage Act
Obama's Lost War on Drugs
Jeremy Kuzmarov
From "Fast and Furious" to Plan Merida.
Tags: Barack Obama, Latin America, Mexico, war on drugs
Consistency?
Josh Brown's Life During Wartime
Tags: Richard Nixon, Barack Obama, Pentagon Papers, Edward Snowden

Historians & History

Jennifer Polk: "Recent PhDs Need to Have Their Confidence Boosted" (INTERVIEW)
David Austin Walsh
"Grad school is very good at grinding people down and making them think they suck, and that's just not true."
Tags: Jennifer Polk, From PhD to Life, interviews
Rescue Behind the Lines in World War II Albania (INTERVIEW)
Robin Lindley
Cate Lineberry's new book The Secret Rescue demonstrates yet again why interviewing our remaining WWII vets is so important.
Tags: World War II, Albania, special operations, interviews

Culture Watch

Slave Revolt Rides on Broken Down Railroad
Bruce Chadwick
Tellin' Man ain't tellin' much.
Tags: play reviews, theater, New York, slavery, Tellin' Man
Fighting to Save a Sleazy Motel in Boston in the 1940s
Bruce Chadwick
Motel Rasdell is a pleasant enough stay.
Tags: Motel Rasdell, New York, play reviews, theater

Books

Review of Christopher Clark's The Sleepwalkers
Jim Cullen
How Europe went to war in 1914, despite men of good will and intelligence working to prevent it.
Tags: Christopher Clark, The Sleepwalkers, World War I, book reviews
Review of Ruth Barton's Hedy Lamarr
Ron Briley
The strange saga of one of Hollywood's first foreign starlets.
Tags: biography, Hedy Lamarr, Hollywood, Ruth Barton