Roundup

Thirty Years after Mount Pleasant Erupted, a Push for Better Treatment Persists

by Mike Amezcua

Central American refugees living in Washington's Mount Pleasant neighborhood had fled US-backed repression but found harsh treatment by immigration authorities and local police. In 1991 frustration erupted. Today, the unrest still raises questions about citizenship and belonging. 

Black America’s Neglected Origin Stories

by Annette Gordon-Reed

History education helps create "origin stories" for individuals and groups that affect how people see themselves and their society. The narrowness and incompleteness of African American history as taught in schools supports limited understandings of Black identity. 

Adjunctification is the Ultimate “Cancel Culture”

by L.D. Burnett

What's impeding free debate and discussion in college classrooms? It's not the power of the faculty, but their weakness and vulnerability to being fired. 

The Game Is Changing for Historians of Black America

by William Sturkey

"Active racism, exclusion, and environmental injustice have systematically destroyed or buried whole sections of Black history. Many of those who gripe about “erasing history” of Confederate monuments and other symbols in the South have no idea how much history has already been erased." Digital newspaper databases and genealogical tools are a key tool for reconstructing the record of Black history.

The Year That Changed Everything

by Akhil Reed Amar

A legal historian and constitutional scholar considers the founding document in terms of the process of its founding. Neither cynical nor purely idealistic, the Constitution did submit to ratification by a broad vote, but pursued national security by institutionalizing the slave power. 

A DARPA for Health? Think Again, President Biden

by Victoria A. Harden

The founder of the Office of NIH History says that the Biden Administration is right to urge a national commitment to health-related research, but shouldn't bother with creating a special task-focused agency; the best support is more and more secure funding for basic research.

The Long Brutality

by Keisha N. Blain

Two police killings highlight the specifically gendered nature of state violence against Black people, and the particular ways Black women are targeted. In this respect, the history of Black Lives Matter is a long history of Black women's political activism.

Can Guantánamo Ever Be Shut Down?

by Karen J. Greenberg

Even if the US's "forever wars" are wound down, it's unclear if the national security state will release its remaining "forever prisoners" at Guantamo Bay. 

Visions against Politics

by Eileen Boris and Annelise Orleck

Historians Eileen Boris and Annelise Orleck are the guest editors of the spring edition of the AAUP's magazine focusing on the need for a New Deal for Higher Education. This is their introductory essay. 

Letters From an American, May 2, 2021

by Heather Cox Richardson

Mitch McConnell's demands that the Department of Education reject a proposal for social studies education that emphasizes antiracism shows that his party is more interested in using education to wage a culture war than in actually improving civics and history education. 

Bad Analogies Undermine our Understanding of History

by David M. Perry and Matthew Gabriele

"When historical analogies are used to foreclose arguments, those analogies aren’t actually historical — they are attempts to leverage one contemporary group’s feelings to sell something."

Germany’s Anti-Vaccination History Is Riddled With Anti-Semitism

by Edna Bonhomme

Antisemitism has often flared during public health crises such as pandemics; it has also attached itself to suspicion of vaccination, a trend that has been disturbingly prominent among German anti-vaxxers. 

The Fermilab Muon Measurement May or May Not Point to New Physics, But ...

by Robert P. Crease

The measurement of the behavior of muons may or may not prove to be a groundbreaking discovery. But it is an achievement that demonstrates the collaboration across disciplines and national borders that represents the best of science. 

How The US Can Pass Civics 101

by Glenn C. Altschuler and David Wippman

American education in civics and history is not succeeding. How can it be improved in a polarized climate when content is a political football? 

What Kind of Fear Is Stopping Joe Biden?

by Samuel Moyn

The course of the Biden administration's policy agenda will be determined by what Democrats are afraid of. In particular, it will matter whether they are more afraid of foreign adversaries or of domestic poverty. 

What History Can Teach Banks About Making Change

by Destin Jenkins

"Celebrating Juneteenth and recruiting more Black bankers is one thing. It is quite another for financial firms to use their unique power to actively undermine the systems that perpetuate racial inequality."

The End of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico

by Pedro Cában

Puerto Rico's status as Estado Libre Asociado (Free Associated State) arose in response to American desires to control the island as a colony while nodding to the island's autonomy during the Cold War. It is not up to the challenges Puerto Ricans face today, but Congress appears unwilling to move on from a colonial relationship.

Police and the License to Kill

by Matthew D. Lassiter

The history of the Detroit Police Department shows that police reforms won't reduce killing as long as departments can set priorities that result in racially targeted and discretionary enforcement and are allowed to investigate and sanction the conduct of their own officers. 

The Real ‘Second-Class Citizens’ Of Academia

by Donald Earl Collins

Cornel West's complaints of being treated like a second-class citizen by Harvard may reflect disrespectful treatment. But thousands of adjunct professors experience worse as a matter of routine on the front lines of American universities. 

Child Welfare Systems Have Long Harmed Black Children Like Ma’Khia Bryant

by Crystal Webster

Although the death of Ma’Khia Bryant has been discussed as yet another example of police violence against Black Americans, it's important to recognize that she was also a victim of a child and family services bureaucracy that has been shaped by racism and left Black children to fend for themselves.