Yale historian David Blight has been in the news lately. Even he is surprised about the frequency of his cable news appearances. His increased visibility derives from two related by difference sources: The Lost Cause and Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. In general terms, his expertise as an historian in the Reconstruction is what […]
State of American History
American Historical Association: Presidential Culture Wars Contretemps
The apology by the American Historian Association President arrived online before the print version from the September newsletter did. It has been a couple of years since a history organization endured a culture wars controversy of its own making: SHEAR CHAOS: A Culture Wars Train Wreck for a History Organization (8/19/20). SHEAR, the Society for […]
What Should You Call Middle Passage Descendants?
WARNING: THIS BLOG USES HISTORICALLY ACCURATE TERMINOLOGY WHICH MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO READERS. IN A CLASSROOM OR AUDIENCE YOU WOULD BE REQUIRED TO SIGN A RELEASE SIGNIFYING YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF THE USE HISTORICALLY ACCURATE BUT POLITICALLY INCORRECT LANGUAGE BEFORE BEING ALLOWED IN At first glance, the question of what name to use for Middle Passage […]
The Power of History Textbooks: A 1619/Critical Race Theory Case Study
History textbooks are in the news. So is the history curriculum. The source of the news is not the federal Department of Education over some new regulation (remember Common Core?). It is not even from the state education departments. Instead it is from the state legislatures plus some Senators, Representatives, and talk-show hosts. The cause […]
The American Revolution: An Academic Perspective
This blog begins a series of conference reports. The series will include conferences I attended and conferences with abstracts posted on the web that I did not attend but know about and consider worth reporting on. In chronological order, the first conference is the annual meeting of the Society for Historians of the Early American […]
Columbus Day 1992: A Glance Back at the Culture War that Divides America Today
In some ways, Columbus Day is Ground Zero for the culture wars. Here is where the two white sides square off in the battle for power in America. Each white side claims right is on its side and as always the American Indians are caught in the middle. This blog is a continuation of a […]
Are You Suffering from TFS (Trump Fatigue Syndrome)? It’s a Global Epidemic
Picture this. You are at a restaurant. You intend to have a nice meal with good company in good surroundings. Then a family sits down at the table near you. There is an 8 year old. He constantly yells and screams and carries on. He makes fun of all the waiters as they walk by […]
If You Are a Native New Yorker, Are You a Native American?: The Weaponization of “Native” and the Culture Wars
The Cherokee Nation is in the news. No, not for the Trail of Tears, but to fulfill a centuries old treaty pledge. The Treaties of Hopewell (1785) and New Echota (1835) contained the right of the Cherokee Nation to send a delegate to the House of Representatives. Now the Cherokees are poised to act upon […]
Museum History: From Maine to the Met to the Erie Canal
Museums have a history, too. Museums today the repositories of historical artifacts available to scholars and the general public alike. However that was not always so. There is a history of how museums came to be what they are today. This topic was the subject of two presentations at conferences in June: “Entertainments at Taverns […]
The American Revolution 250th: A Time to Heal or a Time to Divide?
Now that this year’s July 4th celebration is over, it is time to start looking ahead to the big one, July 4, 2026. That date marks the 250th anniversary of the declaring of the United States of America. It also is the bicentennial of the deaths of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, the second and […]