Current Events that Relate to History
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AntecedentA Free Black Woman, a Memorial to Enslaved Laborers, and the Battle Over U.S. History
How Charlottesville’s memorial landscape can help us understand — and combat — the White House’s violent plans to reshape the nation’s public spaces.Hammer & Hope -
OverviewLoyalty Oaths and the Crisis of the American Revolution
The struggle over loyalty oaths reveals how Americans learned to wield faith and coercion in the name of freedom.Age of Revolutions -
Book ReviewThe Long Road to Nebraska
Springsteen’s 1982 classic has become an American scripture, its ghosts of fathers and highways still haunting today’s America.Arc: Religion, Politics, Et Cetera -
First PersonWe Have Talked Enough About Ourselves
How the marriage of American exceptionalism and liberal Zionism led to genocide.Equator -
CommentYou Can’t Eat Home Runs: Hunger and Games on Atlanta’s Southside
Atlanta’s 1966 Summerhill Rebellion erupted after police shot Harold Prather, exposing racism, poverty, and neglect worsened by stadium-led upheaval.The Metropole -
AntecedentAfter “Abortion”: A 1966 Book and the World That It Made
Before the book’s publication, no one, it seemed, wanted to talk about abortion publicly. But something changed with when the book finally arrived in 1966.Public Books -
exhibitPolarized Lenses
The battle lines taking shape across America's political, media, and cultural spaces seem to be thickening by the day. How can history help us navigate this growing polarization?
From the HNN Archive
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How to Succeed in Government Without Really Trying
The long history of promising an “efficient” federal government. -
If the Slipper Doesn’t Fit
A scorched shoe is a crucial part of Zelda Fitzgerald’s modern mythology. But there’s no proof it existed. -
Indifferent to the Fate of Freedom Elsewhere
Jimmy Carter is known for his defense of human rights worldwide. But in 1979, he threatened to deport thousands of Iranian student protesters. -
Elevating the Few
What JD Vance excludes from the history of the Civil War and immigration. -
Whose Side Are College Administrators On?
There’s a long history of politicians targeting student protesters — and of campus leaders abetting those efforts. -
Solve for AI
What the history of the pocket calculator reveals about the future of AI in classrooms. -
“At Any Future Time”
In 1880, the daughter of a Welsh politician turned to fiction to expose perspectives missing from the official record, upending histories for generations to come. -
Slamming America’s Door Behind Him
How a son of European immigrants fought to keep Indian immigrants out of America. -
Governing by Police
The Metropolitan Police Department in DC has been an essential component of Washington politics since its founding. -
When Good Housekeeping Meant Getting Vaccinated Against Polio
The pages of 1950s lifestyle magazines offer a glimpse of a time when childhood vaccines were anything but controversial.