Things Noted Here and There

by Cliopatria

#21, an ancient/medieval edition of the festival, is up at Gill Polack's Even in a Little Thing. Go over and enjoy it. Nominations for The Cliopatria Awards close on 30 November. Only four days left to place your nominations. David Tiley hosts History Carnival XLIV at Barista on 1 December. Send your nominations of the best of history blogging since 15 November to tiley*at*internode*.*on*.*net or use the form.

Via Miriam Burstein's Little Professor, Goeffrey Chaucer has taken up the Little Prof's practice of listing book acquisitions this week. The list includes The Doctours: The C and I Moost Dangerous Scholastic Thinkers in Europe.

The worste by far ys Thomas Aquinas, who hath argued from Aristoteles principle of the first entelechy that the forme of the soule containeth the sensitif and vegitatif soules, in contradiccioun of the gret tradiciouns of the chirche. Ich drede what shall come to pass yf thes techinges are allowed to poyson the mindes of goode cristen folke.

The book is attributed to Archbishop Thomas Arundel, but I suspect that cur, David Harrowits, is behind it all.

The folks over at Progressive History are doing some serious history. Unitary Moonbat and aphra behn team up for a series on the history of slavery: Ancient Bondage, Of Slaves and Serfs, Slavery Comes to America, and American Bondage. Midtowng recovers a lost (to me, at least) pioneer in air flight, Brazil's Bartolomeu Lourenço de Gusmão.

Phil Mariage's public radio broadcast from Little Rock,"Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow," regularly features guests from three generations on the topic of discussion. In this podcast, Duke's John Hope Franklin, George Mason's Peter Sterns, and UNC's W. Fitzhugh Brundage discuss how history and the study of history have shaped their lives. Thanks to Elizabeth Grant at AHA Today for the tip.

Independently, both Eric Rauchway and Alun Salt have been reconsidering Edward Tufte's"PowerPoint is Evil," Wired, September 2003.

Finally, our colleague, Hugo Schwyzer, has abandoned Typepad for WordPress and is blogging at a new address: Hugo Schwyzer.net. You'll want to change your links to Hugo's site.

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Nonpartisan - 12/5/2006

Fair enough.

Ralph E. Luker - 12/1/2006

I think most of us understand why some history bloggers do it anonymously or pseudonymously. There are lots of problems with trying to notify winners in advance of the convention. The judging of the Awards comes right during busy season for lots of busy historians (end of the semester, with all the wrap-up and grading; holiday prep; etc.) There's lots of additional reading for the judges. The judging is done by committee and largely via e-mail. So it may be very late in December before the committees have reached a decision. Some judges and some committees work more rapidly than others. Even then, it sometimes isn't easy to know how to get in touch with an anonymous or pseudonymous blogger.

Nonpartisan - 12/1/2006

As one of those pseudonymous bloggers myself, I can attest to the need for anonymity. It's an interesting issue because I come from several years of experience in political blogging. While I did so under my pseudonym, I was far more careless about dropping my real name to anyone who cared to ask.

With history it's different because the world is so insular. Your peers are also those who might teach you, hire you, or evaluate you on tenure committees. Often you're writing posts on the work of people you know but who don't know you're writing about them. To be "outed" creates an immediate tension between you and the people who all "know" you now in both your real live and online roles, and can have real consequences in both employment and opportunity.

That said, I don't see how it can hurt to invite one or two of the awardees. Many of the people who blog on my site, for instance, don't work in history and wouldn't care who in the historical profession knew what they were writing. Also some people do blog under their real names (as you know). They could always decline the honor.

Ralph E. Luker - 11/27/2006

Thanks for the thought, Nonpartisan. It's a little more complicated than you might imagine. _Many_ anonymous or pseudonymous bloggers do not want to be publicly identified in any way. That includes appearing at a convention in person to accept an award. Last year, we had a session on history blogging at the AHA convention. We invited bloggers in the audience to identify themselves so everyone could meet those they only virtually knew. But there were awkward moments when some people would tell us their names, but wouldn't say where or under what name they blogged. The virtual wall of anonymity became a real wall of distance from a person standing two feet away from you.

Nonpartisan - 11/27/2006

Keeping in mind that many history bloggers blog anonymously and aren't likely to attend the AHA, wouldn't it be nice to invite, say, the winner of the Best History Writer to attend the AHA meeting and accept the award? This would entail letting them know secretly in advance that they'd won so they could make preparations to travel, but still seems like a good idea to me.