This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: Dissent
2/14/2021
by Gabriel Winant
Historian Gabriel Winant reviews two recent books about the past and present of reactionary white working class politics and considers whether this tendency can be overcome.
Source: Inside Higher Ed
2/16/2021
"There has been so much scholarship produced in the 30 years since the first survivor came forward and it’s almost as if Professor Ramseyer's decision is to just ignore all of the debate -- as if he’s the first person to come into this," said Alexis Dudden, an expert on modern Japanese and Korean history.
Source: Vermont Public Radio
2/15/2021
Dartmouth professor Matthew Delmont discusses the growth and development of Black History Month and the need to understand Black history as integral to the whole of American history.
Source: GamesRadar
2/15/2021
The popular Red Dead Redemption series of Western-themed video games are the jumping-off point for University of Tennessee historian Tore Olsson's course on the opening years of the 20th century.
Source: Politico
2/13/2021
Politico's roundup of expert opinion on the failure of the Senate to get the supermajority needed to convict Trump includes thoughts from historians Mary Frances Berry, Geoffrey Kabaservice, Keisha N. Blain and Allan J. Lichtman.
Source: Wall Street Journal
2/15/2021
David Stewart's new book on George Washington highlights his political skills and careful work at cultivating allies. Far from being an apolitical leader, Washington was a skilled operator whose greatest achievement was avoiding the stigma of politics.
Source: New York Times
2/16/2021
by Andrew Delbanco
Robert Elder's biography of Calhoun examines the racist and pro-slavery thought of the legislator and his political afterlife.
Source: New York Times
2/12/2021
An archaeology paper recently published points to an excavated circle of stones in Wales as the possible original site of Stonehenge.
Source: Washington Post
2/10/2021
Though Trump’s impeachment is not a criminal trial, his lawyers in their legal briefs referenced Brandenburg v. Ohio, arguing that Trump didn’t direct his supporters to attack the Capitol.
Source: The Lily
2/9/2021
Religious Studies scholar Jessica Johnson says that the "Jezebel" trope used against Harris connects suspicion of women's power, old southern stereotypes of Black women as morally deficient, and present-day White Christian Nationalism.
Source: Public Seminar
2/10/2021
Nicole Hemmer, Natalia Mehlman Petrzela and Neil J. Young are the producers of the "Past/Present" podcast. Their new project "Welcome to Your Fantasy" looks at feminism and the sexual revolution through the cultural phenomenon of the Chippendales Dancers. Claire Potter interviews the trio about it.
Source: University of California Press
2/9/2021
by Christy Thornton
Johns Hopkins Latin Americanist Christy Thornton describes her book "Revolution In Development" and its contribution to understanding how Mexican officials fought against dismissive treatment from the world's leading economic powers as they sought a voice in shaping the international economic order.
Source: Perspectives on History
2/11/2021
Laura Ansley reviews Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain's "400 Souls" and reflects on the idea of a community history both in terms of its subjects and its authors.
Source: Black Perspectives
2/11/2021
by Vanessa M. Holden
Historian Vanessa Holden reviews a new book edited by Erica L. Ball, Tatiana Seijas and Terri L. Snyder which draws on the stories of women of African descent in the Americas to argue that such women helped bring freedom into being and defined what freedom in the world actually means.
Source: TIME
2/11/2021
by Olivia B. Waxman
Kate Masur, Eric Foner, Manisha Sinha, Nina Silber and Thavolia Glymph describe the selective and deceptive quotings of Lincoln that have sprung up in this political climate and suggest some futher reading.
Source: The Atlantic
2/11/2021
Atlantic Editor Vann Newkirk examines the recent and imperiled history of American democracy since the Voting Rights Act, including by interviewing Charles Hamilton, co-author of the keystone book "Black Power."
Source: The Atlantic
2/9/2021
by Clint Smith
"The Federal Writers’ Project ex-slave narratives produced tens of thousands of pages of interviews and hundreds of photographs—the largest, and perhaps the most important, archive of testimony from formerly enslaved people in history."
Source: Washington Post
2/9/2021
Nicole Hemmer argues that Limbaugh was instrumental in making the Republican Party captive to its voter base, a base led by the content of increasingly right-wing media.
Source: New York Times
2/5/2021
by Jamelle Bouie
Historians Lisa McGirr, Sara Diamond, and Daniel Schlozman and Sam Rosenfeld argue that the Republican Party has always had to keep a porous border between itself and the hard right groups who led its activist base since the Goldwater years. The borders today seem to be dissolving.
Source: Liveright Publishing
2/4/2021
An all-star panel discussin of the ongoing legacies of Black protest movements features Annette Gordon-Reed, Elizabeth Hinton, and Jelani Cobb.
