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: PajamasMedia
1-12-10
[Ronald Radosh is an Adjunct Senior Fellow at The Hudson Institute, and a Prof. Emeritus of History at the City University of New York.]
Poll after poll shows that most high school students are completely unaware of American history. They confuse the Civil War with World War II; FDR with the Founding Fathers, etc. They don’t have to worry about our nation being condemned to relive the past, since they don’t understand we have one.
It’s bad enough that they get their po
Source: LA Times
1-12-10
A Harvard history professor testified in San Francisco federal court today that procreation has never been the central purpose of marriage in the United States.
Professor Nancy Cott, who has written a book about the history of marriage in the United States, noted that George Washington, the father of the nation, was sterile. Procreation was one of the purposes of marriage but not "the central or defining purpose," Cott testifed. The larger purpose was to create stable hous
Source: Inside Higher Ed
1-12-10
SAN DIEGO -- When Adam Davis was growing up and wanted paper to draw on, his parents gave him the blank back sides of the first typed drafts of the books that established his father, David Brion Davis, as one of the preeminent historians of slavery. Clearly Adam was exposed to history from a young age, and so it’s no surprise, perhaps, that he is now a historian as well. (The senior Davis is Sterling Professor of History Emeritus at Yale University and Adam is associate professor of history at D
Source: LA Times
1-11-10
Scholars, gay and lesbian partners and opponents of same-sex marriage are expected to testify about the nature of marriage and homosexuality during an unprecedented federal trial today to determine whether gays and lesbians may marry....
Challengers of the marriage ban will call to the stand the two same-sex couples who filed the suit and nearly 10 experts who will testify about the history of discrimination against homosexuals and the history of marriage. They also intend to call s
Source: Inside Higher Ed
1-11-10
SAN DIEGO -- As history graduate students arrived in the large table-filled ballroom here Friday to try to learn how to find a job, the room was seriously overheated. These would-be professors didn't need any more sweat or discomfort.
The temperature was adjusted, but the challenges facing those on the job market were an undercurrent here throughout the annual meeting of the American Historical Association. Attendance was down, in no small part because history job openings are way d
Source: The Percolator (Blog)
1-11-10
George W. Bush liked to say that history would be the judge of his presidency. The idea being that history is written at some indeterminate point in the far-off future. How could we ever know what the historians would say? But, of course, they had already started weighing in on the Bush administration well before he left office (and often not all that favorably, either). Now, nearly a year into President Obama's presidency, historians have some things to say about him, too.
There we
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education
1-11-10
Tension over gay-rights protests and a depressed job market set a dismal tone at the American Historical Association's annual conference, held here last week. You didn't have to look very hard to spot either drumming protesters or glum-looking graduate students milling outside the Manchester Grand Hyatt.
What's more, attendance was down sharply. The official number for this year's meeting was 4,158, compared with 5,800 at last year's meeting in New York and 5,400 the year before in
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education
1-6-10
On a Monday evening in mid-October, the historian Tony Judt appeared onstage at the Jack H. Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, in Greenwich Village. "I hope you don't mind if I begin by shooting the elephant in the house," he said, speaking from an electric wheelchair, wrapped in a black blanket, with a Bi-Pap breathing device attached to his nose. "As you can see," he continued, his voice gravelly and labored, "I'm paralyzed from the neck down, and also use this r
Source: Press of Atlantic City
1-10-10
Being an Atlantic City historian can be a pretty cool experience. It can mean anything from sitting down for lunch with a famous movie director to hosting documentary crews from France. It might even involve seeing your own name in lights.
Then why aren’t more young people clamoring for the job? The best-known chroniclers of the resort’s history are senior citizens and aging baby-boomers, and it looks as though few young people are coming up to take their place.
This ha
Source: David Walsh, reporting for HNN
1-10-10
At least 200-300 people assembled in front of the Manchester Grand Hyatt this afternoon to protest the AHA convention’s violation of the boycott against the Hyatt, called after Douglas Manchester, the owner of the hotel, contributed $125,000 to the Proposition 8 campaign. In addition, the hotel is under sanction by union groups because of alleged unfair labor practices.
Cleve Jones, the noted GLBT activist, led the demonstrators in two marches around the Hyatt. Many of the demonstrators, j
Source: David Walsh, reporting for HNN
1-10-10
While the abysmal job market has weighed heavily on the souls of freshly minted PhDs, the AHA at least can rest easy in the knowledge that its financial situation has improved since last year.
In 2009, the AHA lost over a million dollars in the stock market, with its portfolio plummeting from $4 million to $2.9 million, but this year, in addition to running a slight surplus in the operating budget, the AHA portfolio has increased in value to around $3.5 million.
In ot
Source: San Diego Union-Tribune
1-9-10
Waving signs reading: “We All Deserve the Freedom to Marry,” more than 200 gay-rights activists and union members representing hotel employees rallied outside the Manchester Grand Hyatt on Saturday in the latest protest over the owner’s support for a ban on gay marriage.
The protesters banged on drums, blew whistles and waved rainbow flags while chanting “Boycott the Hyatt — Check! Out! Now!”
The 2 p.m. rally targeted the American Historical Association, which decided t
Source: Historiann (Blog)
1-9-10
Greetings from sunny San Diego! My view of San Diego Bay from the 17th floor of the Hilton gives some idea of just how lovely and temperate it is here right now (see the photo on the right, by Claude himself.) And the Hilton conveniently provides running maps to cover various distances along the promenade. Historiann, you would love it!
I have no actual idea of the numbers at this year’s AHA, but I can’t help but think that it’s down from recent years. Not one of the panels I
Source: Historiann
1-9-10
While I’m waiting for the exclusive report from Classy Claude to be filed from this year’s meeting of the American Historical Association, I thought I’d draw your attention to a comment from The History Enthusiast, who said that everyone in the pit on Thursday was a real Debbie Downer:
As a first-timer at the AHA Job Center I can report that it was much quieter than I expected (everyone was so tense!) and there were very few people milling around. That shouldn’t really be a surprise.
Source: The Percolator (Blog)
1-7-10
Here's a straightforward question: Is Google good for history? Or, more specifically, is Google Books good for historians?
That was the topic of a lively afternoon session at the American Historical Association's annual conference, happening right now in San Diego. The answer, as you might expect, wasn't equally straightforward. In fact, for nearly two hours historians alternately praised Google for its stunningly ambitious project to digitize the world's books and berated the compa
Source: David Walsh
1-8-10
Tensions between the AHA and the Committee for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender History were evident in the CLGBTH’s business meeting – there have been miscommunications between the two groups, and a number of members felt that the AHA had not done enough to inform its membership of alternatives to accommodation at the Grand Hyatt. The AHA itself is not spending a huge amount of money at the Hyatt – the meeting rooms are pro gratis – and so the hotel will be making most of its money from
Source: Medieval News
1-7-10
The American Historical Association kicks off its annual meeting today, in San Diego, California, amidst controversy over the choice of location and problems in attendance.
Some of the events are being held at the Manchester Grand Hyatt, whose owner contributed heavily to the campaign in the state against same-sex marriage. The 1,625-room resort has been the subject of a boycott by gay-rights activists since July 2008.
There were calls for the historians to boycott the
Source: More or Less Bunk (Blog)
1-7-10
I’m so glad I’m not in San Diego right now, because watching the academic job market in action always makes my head hurt. It also gives me flashbacks to my underemployed days, which are no fun either. Writing about it doesn’t exactly improve my mood, but I’ve been feeling like doing just that ever since I read the summary of the new AHA jobs report earlier this week. If you haven’t seen it, the news isn’t good:
In the 2008–09 academic year job advertisements fell by 23.8 percent
Source: Nothing Recedes Like Success (Blog)
1-4-10
The AHA begins on Thursday, and it’s likely to be a bleak, long weekend in San Diego. While the rich and well-funded among us will enjoy a respite in the expensive southern California city, a storm is brewing on the Pacific coast that may well wash over the nation’s most venerable historical association like a tsunami. To start, GLBTQ activists are boycotting the convention’s main hotel, despite the AHA’s best efforts to fashion a compromise rather than walking away from its contract with the Hy
Source: More or Less Bunk (Blog)
1-8-10
Marc Bousquet has certainly started a far-reaching discussion about the job market for historians. Besides what’s at Marc’s home blog, I’ve only gotten to the part at Historiann (which, to return her favor, is well worth your time). I’ll finish reading all the other links in Marc’s new post as soon as I finish holding down my end of this conversation. Here’s Marc:
I also take Jonathan’s point…that eliminating certain programs might do the profession good. That’s probably true in
