Historians in the News: Latest
Following is a list of historians who have been the subject of news stories. The list is arranged in reverse chronological order, as are the entries within each section. Entries are taken from the websites cited.
BRYAN LE BEAU: Accused of Plagiarism
The Chronicle of Higher Education has reported a charge of plagiarism against Bryan Le Beau. Sally Greene, an adjunct professor at the University of North Carolina's law school, made the discovery via a simple Google search and comments on her finding. The accusation is that Le Beau's Commencement Address at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, in December 2003 substantially plagiarized from Cornel West's Commencement Address at Wesleyan University on 30 May 1993. Greene and the Chronicle of Higher Education identify parallel passages. LeBeau denied he ever read West's speech, but says he must have read an account of it somewhere.
ALLEN WEINSTEIN: Visiting Nixon Library
- US archivist Allen Weinstein will make his first visit to the privately run Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace this week to seek assurances about the facility's commitment to professionalizing its operations before it receives federal funding and Nixon's publicly held archives. ''We have to raise everyone's comfort level to the fact that things are being done to honor that agreement," Weinstein said in an interview last week. ''And that's what I'm looking for. I want my own comfort level raised." After an embarrassing episode in which the library canceled a conference on Nixon and Vietnam -- drawing complaints from historians -- Weinstein and library executive director John Taylor exchanged letters last month in which they set out several steps the library would take. Among them: Make public the late president's confidential tape recordings on politics, redesign some exhibits to National Archives standards, and schedule a new Vietnam conference.
- Weinstein sworn in as Archivist of the United States.
- Historian Allen Weinstein's nomination as Archivist of the United States has been approved by the United States Senate.
- On the eve of the Senate committee vote recommending his nomination as Archivist of the United States, Allen Weinstein's reputation and character were called into question by people who lured him two decades ago to run a high-profile institute in California. In 1984 Weinstein was appointed to revive the fortunes of the Robert Maynard Hutchins Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions at the University of California at Santa Barbara. Eight months later he left in a cloud of doubts about his management abilities, according to a press account at the time.
- Allen Weinstein moved one step closer to becoming the next national archivist on Monday night, when the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs approved his nomination and forwarded it to the full Senate. The nomination, which raised some eyebrows when it was announced last spring, was endorsed on an unrecorded voice vote. There was no discussion. Mr. Weinstein's nomination was at first clouded with controversy over his past in academe and the circumstances under which the current archivist, John W. Carlin, resigned. Concerns about Mr. Weinstein stemmed from his refusal to release notes from his 1978 book on the Alger Hiss case. Critics questioned what that stand portended for his work as archivist, a position with sway over scholars' access to such public records as presidential papers and other official documents. Concern over that issue largely abated after Mr. Weinstein's appearance before the committee last July, when he asserted his commitment to access. Bruce Craig, director of the National Coalition for History, said that at this point it is important for the confirmation to proceed as quickly as possible given planned budget cuts."We need someone who's an activist archivist, who can work with the White House," Mr. Craig said, noting that Mr. Weinstein was appointed by President Bush but has bipartisan appeal, something the outgoing archivist, John Carlin, as a lame duck, cannot claim. Sen. Susan M. Collins, the Maine Republican who is chairwoman of the Senate committee, and Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, the panel's top Democrat, said they hoped the nomination would go to the Senate floor this week. (subscribers only)
- In an editorial the Wash Post comes out in favor of Allen Weinstein's nomination as chief archivist of the US:"Mr. Weinstein, who spent a year during the early 1980s writing editorials for this page, is best known for his book"Perjury: The Hiss-Chambers Case," which concluded that Alger Hiss was a Soviet spy. Mr. Weinstein drew fire from fellow historians for refusing to share his files for the book, and some critics have taken the episode as boding ill for Mr. Weinstein's devotion to openness. While we think their concerns could have benefited from greater scrutiny by the Senate -- which should have let opponents testify at his confirmation hearing -- they should not prevent Mr. Weinstein from being confirmed. Much more troubling, however, is the Bush administration's still unexplained move to oust Mr. Carlin and install its own candidate. That heavy-handed and questionable process will make it all the more important for Mr. Weinstein, if he is confirmed, to demonstrate his independence and commitment to robust disclosure."
- Members of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee on Thursday grilled Allen Weinstein, the Bush administration's nominee to be the national archivist, questioning his commitment to public-records access.
- Mr. Weinstein's testimony at the Hearing on His Nomination to be Archivist of the United States, U.S. Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs.
- The Nation editorializes against historian Allen Weinstein's selection as chief archivist of the U.S.
- HISTORIAN ALLEN WEINSTEIN SLOTTED BY BUSH ADMINISTRATION TO BE NEXT ARCHIVIST OF THE UNITED STATES On 8 April 2004, the White House announced (see announcement at http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/04/20040408-2.html ) that President George W. Bush intends to nominate historian Allen Weinstein to become the ninth Archivist of the United States. Weinstein currently works at the International Foundation for Elections Systems as Senior Advisor for Democratic Institutions and Director of its Center for Democratic Initiatives. Along with former Archivist of the United State Don W. Wilson, Weinstein is also a trustee of the Boston based Mary Baker Eddy Library for the Betterment of Humanity, which is affiliated with the Christian Science church.
HASHEM AGHAJARI: Back to Teaching
- Iranian Historian Released from Prison: An Iranian appeals court has ruled that dissident academic Hashem Aghajari, once condemned to death for blasphemy, does not have to go back to jail and can resume teaching, his lawyer announced. A court in the western city of Hamedan initially sentenced the leftist scholar to hang, and even upheld its verdict when a re-trial was ordered in the face of angry student protests and international pressure.
- Iranian Historian Released from Prison: Iran's leading academic dissident Hashem Aghajari has been freed on bail after two years in jail facing the death penalty for telling Iranians not to follow their clerical leaders like"monkeys.""I hope there will come a day when no-one goes to prison in Iran for his opinions, let alone be sentenced to death," Aghajari, speaking through his tears, told reporters outside his apartment in north Tehran on Saturday. His joyous family handed out confectionery and orange juice to journalists. Long-haired Aghajari, 47, beaming with delight, embraced close friends gathered outside home.
- A prominent history professor twice condemned to death on blasphemy charges has been sentenced to three years in jail for insulting Islamic sacred beliefs, the judge in charge of the case said Tuesday. The defendant's lawyer said he would appeal. (7-20-04)
- Iran's hard-line judiciary backed off from the death sentence issued against a history professor, his lawyer said Monday. The sentencing of Hashem Aghajari had sparked days of protests in 2002. (6/28/04)
- Historian Sentenced to Death: Iran's Supreme Court has, for the second time, overturned a death sentence on a history professor convicted of apostasy for attacking clerical rule.
- Hashem Aghajari won't appeal a reinstated death sentence, effectively challenging Iran's hard-line judges to execute him for criticizing clerical rule, his lawyer said.
- Iran's Supreme Court on Friday Feb. 14, 2003 revoked the death sentence imposed in November against the chairman of the history department at Tarbiat Modarres University, in Tehran. (Subscribers only.)
- Juan Cole, The Historian Sentenced to Death
RASHID KHALIDI: Banned from NYC Schools
- The New York City Department of Education will prohibit a professor of Arab studies at Columbia University from appearing in an occasional training program for secondary-school teachers, citing the professor's criticism of Israel. Rashid Khalidi, director of Columbia's Middle East Institute, had spoken this month at one of a series of teacher-development workshops, paid for by the university, about Middle Eastern culture and politics. But last week, after The New York Sun published an article assailing Mr. Khalidi's involvement in the program, Joel I. Klein, the city's schools chancellor, announced that the professor would no longer be allowed to participate. (Chronicle of Higher Ed subscribers only)
- NY Sun reports that Khalidi called on Palestinians to kill Israeli soldiers.
- Mr. Khalidi is the new Edward Said Professor of Middle East Studies at Columbia University and the new head of the university’s Middle East Institute. Critics charge that he has made incendiary statements about Israel.
PHILIP ZELIKOW: Considered for a Post at the State Department
- Aides say Condoleezza. Rice is considering her friend Philip D. Zelikow, a historian at the University of Virginia who was staff director of the commission that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks and her co-author on a book about German reunification, for a job as counselor.
- Philip Zelikow/9-11 Commission: The staff director of the independent Sept. 11 commission has sent a memorandum to Capitol Hill praising provisions of a Republican House proposal to enact the panel's major recommendations, complicating delicate last-minute negotiations in Congress on Tuesday because the 10 members of the commission and the White House have endorsed provisions of a rival bipartisan Senate bill. House Republicans made public the Oct. 23 memorandum from Philip D. Zelikow, the former staff director, as proof that House negotiators were not standing in the way of a compromise bill to enact the commission's chief recommendation: creation of the powerful job of a national intelligence director to coordinate the government's spy agencies.
- William Safire is attacking Philip Zelikow, the executive director of the 9-11 commission after the commission's staff issued a report denying a collaborative relationship between Saddam and Al Qaeda. Safire claims the commission has been manipulated by its staff.
- Historian Philip Zelikow is taken to task for arranging that W.W. Norton--a publisher of many of his books--gets a contract to publish the proceeedings of the 9-11 commission in July. Some commissioners indicate that they never knew about his relationship with Norton.
- Mr. Zelikow, the director of the Miller Center of Public Affairs at Virginia,"held a similar job in a bipartisan commission on electoral reform that had been led by former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald R. Ford."
DAVID IRVING: Writing 2 New Books
GERALD MARKOWITZ AND DAVID ROSNER: Under Attack by the Chemical Industry
- Twenty of the biggest chemical companies in the United States have launched a campaign to discredit two historians who have studied the industry's efforts to conceal links between their products and cancer. In an unprecedented move, attorneys for Dow, Monsanto, Goodrich, Goodyear, Union Carbide and others have subpoenaed and deposed five academics who recommended that the University of California Press publish the book Deceit and Denial: The Deadly Politics of Industrial Pollution, by Gerald Markowitz and David Rosner.
KENNETH MAXWELL: Kissinger's Interference Led to His Resignation
- Kenneth Maxwell, the historian who resigned from the Council on Foreign Relations, says that Henry Kissinger pressured the editor of the group's journal, Foreign Relations, to drop a rejoinder by Maxwell critical of Kissinger's role in the coup that ended Chile's democracy in 1973. For the first time Maxwell has recounted conversations he had with the editor which flatly contradict the editor's stated recollections. The story, recounted in the Nation, suggests the reputation of the esteemed journal may have been put in jeopardy.
DANIEL PIPES: Settles Lawsuit
- Pipes settles lawsuit. A University of Oregon sociology instructor has settled a defamation lawsuit against authors of a column that labeled him anti-Semitic and listed him as one of six examples of"left-wing extremists" who indoctrinate students. Douglas Card sued the column's authors: Daniel Pipes, a Middle East scholar; and Pipes' research assistant, Jonathan Schanzer, a specialist in radical Islamist movements. Card claimed the pair is wrong about how and what he teaches and their column defamed him. Terms of the settlement are confidential. In a joint statement issued by both parties, Pipes and Schanzer said they"are now convinced that Card does not condone extremism in the classroom." In their 2002 column, published in the New York Post and on several Web sites, Pipes and Schanzer accused Card of describing Israel as"a terrorist state" and Israelis as"baby killers" in his course.
- Tariq Ramadan, the Swiss scholar denied a visa by the Homeland Security Department, is blaming Daniel Pipes in part. Pipes says he only investigated Ramadan's suspected ties to Islamists after his visa had been denied. The Chicago Tribune publishes an article in which Ramadan addresses Pipes's allegations point by point.
- Wall Street Journal endorses Pipes's nomination.
- LAT endorses Pipes's nomination.
- Washington Post: Is his nomination in trouble?
- frontpagemag.com:"The Council of American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and its allies are working to turn the hearings [on Pipes's nomination] into a lynching party of Borkian proportions."
- Pipes sued by sociology professor at the University of Oregon who claims he was faslely depicted as an anti-Semite.
- Bush makes a recess appointment; Pipes is in.
- Wall Street Journal: Pipes is the victim of Muslim slanders.
- Washington Post recommends the Senate reject Pipes's nomination.
- "Muslims Protest Bush Nominee"
- President Bush has nominated Middle East expert Daniel Pipes to the board of directors at the U.S. Institute of Peace.
- "York Center for International and Security Studies, withdrew last week as a co-sponsor of the forum and canceled a private luncheon with Mr. Pipes because of his involvement with Campus Watch" (Chronicle of Higher Education, January 27, 2003).
- Stanley Kurtz defends Pipes in an article in National Review (January 7, 2003).
DOUGLAS BRINKLEY: Errors Found in His Account of John Kerry's War Record
FRANK WILLIAMS: Admits Copying Inadvertently
- Similarities with other writings have turned up in several passages RI Supreme Court Justice Frank Williams wrote in a chapter in a book on Lincoln. Earlier this week he conceded that he"inadvertently" used the opening paragraphs of a 1957 magazine story in an article he wrote on Lincoln in 1993.
- Devoted Abraham Lincoln scholar and state Supreme Court Chief Justice Frank J. Williams acknowledged last week that he"inadvertently" used the opening paragraphs of a 1957 Journal magazine story in an article he wrote on Lincoln in 1993."I feel terrible, mortified, embarrassed," Williams said."I take full responsibility for it."
JAMES LAINE: Threatened with Jail
SAM TANENHAUS: Named Editor of the NYT Book Review
LEONARD F. GUTTRIDGE: Accused of using phony documents in a conspiracy history of the Lincoln assassination
CONRAD BLACK: Caught in Financial Scandal as His Book on FDR Appears
RICHARD MCCORMICK
CARLOS MESA: The Historian Who Became the President of Bolivia
DAVID McCULLOUGH: Wins Boston Patriot Award
- The Freedom Trail Foundation today announced that David McCullough has been named the recipient of the 2003 Boston Patriot Award.
- The National Endowment for the Humanities has named David McCullough as the 2003 Jefferson Lecturer in the Humanities.
- Mr. McCullough: Invited to attend the Bush State of the Union Address, 2003
- Philip Nobile, The David McCullough Nobody Knows
RICHARD NORTON SMITH: Picked to Run the Lincoln Presidential Library
KENNETH T. JACKSON: Leaving the NY Historical
DAVID GARROW: Not Teaching this Semester at Emory
JOSEPH BRAUDE: Arrested for Allegedly Smuggling in Iraqi Artifacts
GEORGE CHAUNCEY: Fighting for Civil Liberties for Gay People
- How his history of gay rights helped shape the Supreme Court decision in Lawrence v. Texas.
- "A group of historians, led by University of Chicago Professor George Chauncey, filed an amicus (or friend of the court) brief for the appellants, pointing to errors and confusion in the Bowers court's interpretation of the historical record on state anti-sodomy laws, including its definition of"sodomy" itself."
JAMES F. BROOKS: Takes Home 3 History Prizes
JOHN ESPOSITO: Feeling Under Attack
PHILIP FONER: Guilty of Plagiarism?
CHRISTINE HEYRMAN: Trouble Counting?
KEITH WINDSCHUTTLE: Under Attack in Australia
- Establishment historians in Australia attack Windschuttle; conservatives rally to his defense.
- Blogger Erin O'Connor reviews the controversy and defends Windschuttle.
- Windschuttle defended from plagiarism charge.
- Controversial Australian historian Keith Windschuttle has been accused of plagiarism by one of his critics, La Trobe University professor Robert Manne.
- Keith Windschuttle , author of The Fabrication of Aboriginal History, argues that"the genocide of Aborigines in Tasmania is a myth, perpetrated by left-wing apologists and based on distorted or fabricated historical evidence."
STEPHEN HOWARTH: Victim of Plagiarism?
ROBERT CARO: Jumps into the Filibuster Fight
BRIAN VANDEMARK: Accused of Plagiarism
ILAN PAPPE: Haifa University Nixes His Conference
ROBERT DAVID"KC" JOHNSON: Awarded tenure.
NIALL FERGUSON: TV historian accused of romanticizing British imperialism.
- The revisionist argument over empire.
- False and dangerous: Revisionist TV history of Britain's empire is an attempt to justify the new imperial order.
- "'It's like being naked in the street' Niall Ferguson is the latest historian to strike it rich on television. So why, asks Cassandra Jardine, is he so afraid of poverty?"
NICHOLAS DeGENOVA: Calls for a Million Mogadishus
- Columbia resists call of Republican congressmen to fire DeGenova.
- 104 House members demand firing of Columbia Assistant Professor DeGenova.
- At an antiwar rally De Genova, who teaches history and anthropology, began by denouncing U.S. flags as the"emblem of the invading war machine in Iraq today. They are the emblem of the occupying power. The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military." He then called upon American troops to murder their officers and expressed the hope"for a million Mogadishus."
MILITARY HISTORIANS: Reservists Who Are Collecting the History of the War in Iraq
IAN KERSHAW: Breaks with TV producers of movie based on his book.
HENRY KAMEN: Under attack in Spain.
JOHN HOPE FRANKLIN: Joing the lawsuit filed by victims of the Tulsa Race Riot.
JOERG FRIEDRICH: The Germans were victims of Allied bombing in WW II.
ANDREW ROBERTS: Host of a new BBC series on history.
- "Andrew Roberts, the acclaimed historian, whose new BBC series will propel him into the ranks of popular presenters, is an unashamed master of self-promotion. But he still finds time for 'the woman of my dreams.'"
- "The BBC, he is pleased to report, has not forced him to dumb down when discussing Hitler and Churchill."
CHRISTOPHER HILL: Was he a Soviet mole?
BENNY MORRIS: Disenchanted
ERIC HOBSBAWM: Still Likes the Soviet Union
DONALD KAGAN: Awarded National Humanities Medal
BASHEER NAFI: Accused of being an Islamic terrorist.
JACK GRANATSTEIN: Testifies in favor of war with Iraq.
CHRIS ANDREW: Professor chosen to write official history of MI5.
LOUIS MENAND: Orwell was"honest, decent, wrong."
ALLEN MURPHY: Dispute about his claim that Justice Douglas wasn't entitled to be buried at Arlington.
DORIS KEARNS GOODWIN: Her son may be going off to fight in Iraq.
JAN GROSS: Historian who revealed the truth about a Polish town's where hundreds of Jews were killed.
ALEX ROLLAND: Historian of NASA
JAMES LINDGREN: Questions survey allegedly conducted by pro-gun economist
JAMES E. JENNINGS: Leads delegation to Iraq to protest war.
AHARON BREGMAN: Discovers identity of the Egyptian who tipped off Israel about invasion that led to the Six Day War
JORG FRIEDRICH: Assailed for Claiming Germans Were Victims Too
HOWARD ZINN: Peacemaker
PAUL BUHLE: Accused of Misrepresenting the History of Communism
BRIAN VICTORIA: Credited with Exposing the Violent History of Zen
LYNDALL RYAN: Accused of Mangling Evidence
BRENT GLASS: Profile of the Historian Who Has Taken Over the Smithsonian
JOY HAKIM: New PBS Series Based on Her Books
PETER KIRSTEIN: In Public Brawl with Instapundit
MILAN BULAJIC: Yugoslav Historian Apologizes for Holocaust Quotes
ERIC FONER: His Fight with Daniel Pipes
GLENDA GILMORE: Her Fight with Daniel Pipes
NECIP HABLEMITOGLU: Assassinated in Ankara
CHRISTOPHER ANDREW: Appointed Official Historian of MI5
EUGENE M. TOBIN: President of Hamilton College Resigns
ALAN CHARLES KORS: On Bias in Academia
- Alan Kors, Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania, is attracting national attention with his new book, The Shadow University: The Betrayal of Liberty on America's Campuses, co-authored with Harvey Silverglate. Kors, President of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), argues that the left has taken over college campuses.
HENRY REYNOLDS: Caught Misquoting
RICHARD BERTHOLD:"Anybody Who Blows Up the Pentagon Gets My Vote"
ROBERT DALLEK: On Kennedy's Medical Ailments
DANIEL GOLDHAGEN: His Publisher Sued By The Catholic Church
MICHAEL BELLESILES: Misuse of Records, Bad Scholarship, etc.
PETER KIRSTEIN: Denounces a Cadet as a Baby-Killer
ANN LANE: Her Dissertation
JOYCE APPLEBY: Historians' Petition on Iraq
STEPHEN AMBROSE: Accused of Plagiarism
JOSPEH ELLIS: Inventing Stories About His Past
LOUIS ROBERTS: Accused of Plagiarism
EDWARD A. PEARSON: Book Withdrawn by University of North Carolina Press