Historians in the News

To Understand Contemporary American Culture, Look To Marvel Comics’ Stan Lee

Stan Lee's approach to comics, described in a new biography by Abraham Reismna, enabled the creation of denser universes of characters and also created a fan culture that affects how popular culture is made, enjoyed and discussed.

Historians for Peace and Democracy (H-PAD) Launches a Virtual Speakers Program

35 scholars are part of this initiative to schedule virtual speakers on topics of political and social significance, without honoraria. 

Female Faculty Wrote a Brave Letter to Northwestern about Sexual Harassment, Racism Allegations from Cheerleaders.

“The idea that some of the people taking this class from me might be subjected to the very things we’re discussing, during campus-sanctioned activities,” [History Professor Kate] Masur said, “it’s jarring and disgusting.”

'We Deserve More': An Amazon Warehouse’s High-Stakes Union Drive

Historians Joseph McCartin, Michael Innis Jiménez, and Kerri Leigh Merritt discuss the historic union drive at Amazon's Bessemer, Alabama center and where it fits in the history of labor and civil rights in the south. 

Pankaj Mishra’s Reckoning With Liberalism’s Bloody Past

Indian critic Pankaj Mishra argues in a new book of essays that recent liberal concern about right-wing politicians declaring support for "western civilization" ignores the way that liberal colonialists have embraced ideas of cultural supremacy. 

The Food that Built America: The Kings of Burgers

Historians Marcia Chatelain and Mireya Loza are featured in the History Channel's documentary on the rise of fast food in America. 

A Look Inside the Green Book, Which Guided Black Travelers Through a Segregated and Hostile America

UCLA historian Scot Brown calls the "Green Book" a "Black GPS" for the Jim Crow era in an overview of the publication that helped African Americans exercise the freedom to travel. 

Behind The Former Slave Narratives Captured By A New Deal Program

Writer Clint Smith: "the narratives are full of those moments that remind you of the personhood of these people who in so much of our teaching of history are sort of these silhouettes or these abstractions."

Henry Louis Gates Jr. on African-American Religion

Jon Meacham reviews Henry Louis Gates's book on the Black church in America; Gates seeks to recover the traditions of social and political activism in churches against skeptics who identify religion with conservatism and quietude. 

Jewish Refugee Scholars at Black Colleges

The work of European Jewish academics at Historically Black Colleges in the United States is an underrecognized part of both Black and Jewish American history; many prominent African Americans were students of refugee professors. 

Historians Correct Nikki Haley After George Washington Tweet

Nikki Haley's recent tweet suggested that, as president, George Washington helped establish the Constitution (which of course created the office). 

Politics, Protests, and Pandemics

Historian Samuel K. Cohn, Jr. argues in a new book on epidemics and social upheaval that disease does not inevitably sow discord and hatred; they can be sources of unification. 

Historian Corrects Nikki Haley's George Washington Tweet

Historian and Washington biographer Alexis Coe takes apart Nikki Haley's faulty references to George Washington's role in the founding. 

Russian Court Rejects Jailed Gulag Historian's Appeal Against Long Sentence

Yuri Dmitriev's appeal of a 13-year sentence was denied. He and his supporters contend that the charges were fabricated to punish him for writing about Stalinist atrocities in defiance of Russian nationalism. 

How White Liberals Destroyed the 1970s’ Soul City

by Brentin Mock

The new book "Soul City: Race, Equality, and the Lost Dream of an American Utopia," by Seton Hall Law School professor Thomas Healy, explores the history of how and why Floyd McKissick’s experiment came to be, and its unceremonious end. 

Why Fred Hampton Needs to Be on Your Kids’ American History Syllabus

Writer and poet Scott Woods developed a political consciousness watching a 1971 documentary on the assassination of Black Panther leader Fred Hampton. He was prepared to be disappointed by the new "Judas and the Black Messiah" but argues the film tells a story that is more important than ever.

The Americans Who Embraced Mussolini

Katy Hull's book looks to four American fascist sympathizers to conclude that the appeal of fascism reflected anxieties about how the United States could function as a world power and connect communitarian values with national progress. 

The Lockdown Showed How the Economy Exploits Women. She Already Knew

Silvia Federici's critique of the exploitatitve nature of domestic labor as the backbone of capitalist economies is beginning to gain traction as homes are converted to schools and (paid) workplaces, compounding gendered burdens borne mostly by women in America. 

How to Teach History in a Community Still Reckoning With Its Past

"For the African American community, it was still this large, looming scar, and the white community literally didn’t even know what had happened. It had just been erased. There was this disconnect in the community."

Biden and the Fed Leave 1970s Inflation Fears Behind

Biden's economic advisors appear to be treating unemployment, eviction and poverty wages as more serious problems than modest inflation, reversing decades of austerity-driven guidance.