Historians in the News

Christopher Lasch, the late historian/social commentator, is suddenly everywhere

by Kevin Mattson

What we can learn from Lasch — and what we can’t.

China Bars Historian at Australian University From Leaving, Lawyer Says

Feng Chongyi, a Chinese-born professor at an Australian university who has often criticized Beijing’s crackdown on political dissent, has been barred from leaving China and is being questioned by state security officers as a suspected threat to national security.

Harvard art historian’s interest in black history has roots in her grandfather’s question in high school

He demanded to know "Where are the African-Americans in this history book?"

Human History ‘Will End When Men Become Gods’

And we’re on the verge of doing just that, says Yuval Noah Harari.

Yale’s Timothy Snyder explains to Bill Maher how Trump resembles 1930s fascists — and makes the Russia connection

Snyder told Maher Americans must defend institutions. Many anticipate that “the institution will save us” but Snyder said that this kind of thinking is wrong. “We have to save the institutions."

The New York Times celebrates biographer Richard Holmes

Holmes is out with a memoir reflecting on his long career as a biographer of Robert Louis Stevenson, Shelley, and others.

Historians are in demand! (On cruise ships)

Viking Cruises has launched a new Resident Historian Program.

Douglas Brinkley says there’s a "smell of treason in the air"

"This is the most failed first 100 days of any president.”

Mary Maples Dunn, Advocate of Women’s Colleges and President of Smith, Dies at 85

Maples received her bachelor’s degree from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va., in 1954. She earned her master’s, in 1956, and her doctorate, in 1959 — both in colonial American history — from Bryn Mawr College.

Gil Troy says Jews and Israelis are the victims of a “Hate Swarm”

by Gil Troy

He includes among the culprits his own university’s student newspaper, as he writes in an Open Letter.

Eric Foner interviews Matt Karp about his new book on slaveholders

Karp focuses on the international ambitions of slaveholders and their control over foreign policy.

Are historians ignoring the history of originalism?

by Jonathan Gienapp

That’s what this historian thinks.

Mark Noll says evangelicals voted for Trump for lots of reasons, abortion among them

"But I’m worried about the Christian populace at large listening all the time to their media go-to and never being concerned about folks who are trying to see things more broadly."

Nell Irvin Painter tells NY Magazine Americans need to stop thinking of the working class as white

It’s part of a larger problem: The assumption that real Americans are white people.

Yuval Noah Harari: "Homo sapiens as we know them will disappear in a century or so"

The visionary historian, author of two dazzling bestsellers on the state of mankind, takes questions from Lucy Prebble, Arianna Huffington, Esther Rantzen and a selection of our readers.

Historian John Fea’s twitterstorm in defense of the NEH

In a series of posts Fea took note of the superlative programs the NEH and NEA have funded.

36 hours after the election this historian at the University of Minnesota decided to create a course on Donald Trump

His name is David Chang. And students can now take his course: “Donald Trump and the Far Right in the American History and Society.”

Polish historian's book on killing of Jews exposes raw nerve

Barbara Engelking says that while the"responsibility for the extermination of Jews in Europe is borne by Nazi Germany" the "Polish peasants were volunteers in the sphere of murdering Jews."  

OAH endorses History Relevance campaign

The Organization of American Historians is pleased to endorse the History Relevance Campaign’s Value Statement—seven distinct tenets delineating critical ways the study of history is essential to individuals, communities, and our shared future.

Bancroft Prize for History Awarded

The three recounts:  Andrés Reséndez, Heather Ann Thompson, Nancy Tomes.