Historians in the News

Conference to mark the opening of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture

The Future of the African American Past, a landmark conference featuring leading historians bringing fresh insights to long-standing questions about the field of African American history, will be held in Washington, DC, on May 19-21, 2016.

Report: Number of history PhD’s is at a record, while the number of students majoring in history is falling

by Robert B. Townsend

More bad news: Progress in attracting women to the discipline has largely stalled—and among undergraduates actually reversed.

Judith Stein says neoliberalism broke the American working class

How? Through bad trade policies.

Mary Beard hailed in the NYT for her campaign against Internet trolling

The acclaimed Cambridge classicist takes on everything from Internet stalkers to women’s rights.

Poland: Prosecutor probes Holocaust historian who said Poles killed more Jews than Germans

Jan Tomasz Gross, a Jewish Polish-born history professor based at Princeton University, was interrogated for hours.

Thomas Fleming Wins Coveted Writer’s Award

The New York American Revolution Round Table named Fleming’s "The Great Divide, The Conflict Between Washington and Jefferson that Still Divides America" the best book of 2015.

Croatian Historian Condemns Minister’s WWII Rhetoric

Natasa Matausic, a historian who specialises in Croatia’s World War II history, said the country’s new culture minister Zlatko Hasanbegovic should apologise for past statements praising fascist fighters.

Report: Historians in 107 countries were subject to censorship or persecution in 2016

by Antoon De Baets

The report contains 123 pages of news about the domain where history and human rights intersect, especially involving the censorship of history and the persecution of historians, archivists, and archaeologists around the globe, as reported by various human rights organizations.

Petition calls for dismissal of UCLA historian Gabriel Piterberg

He was accused of sexual assault against two students.

Alfred L. Brophy says the field of legal history has changed dramatically in the last couple of decades

In an interview he says legal historians now focus on how outsiders have remade the law.

Historians trying to draw attention to the neglected worst engineering disaster of the 20th century

It was the collapse of a damn near LA in 1928 that left 500 dead

History Professor Asks Class to Imagine a ‘Good World’ As a ‘World Without Whiteness’

“And how do we get to that good world is the question? A world without conflict. And to me, my interpretation of these words is it would be a world for the U.S. without whiteness, in terms of the power structure.” — James Harrison, Portland Community College

Ken Burns's "Jackie Robinson" celebrates American hero

Jackie Robinson was not the best baseball player who ever lived, but renowned filmmaker Ken Burnsmakes a strong argument that he was the most important one.

Most Canadian history is written by men

Historian Margaret MacMillan finds that upsetting.

Tweets from the OAH Annual Meeting

Interesting tweets from the annual meeting of the Organization of American Historians 2016.

Daniel Pipes says Trump’s brand of politics is neo-fascist

by Daniel Pipes

"He encourages participants at his rallies physically to assault critics and has offered to cover their legal fees."

Annual Meeting of the Organization of American Historians: 2016

Highlights from the annual meeting being held in Providence, RI.

Historian says California needs to drop the name of Hindenburg from a local park where Nazi sympathizers once held rallies

by Cora Granata

But Cora Granata says we need to remember California’s dark past when German Americans celebrated militaristic leaders.

A dream team of scholars — Annette Gordon-Reed and Peter Onuf — collaborate on a book on Jefferson

“People read history the way we watch movies, where you have a good guy and a bad guy. What’s the point of even going to the library to do research if you already know what you think?” — Annette Gordon-Reed

Historian William Lawrence O’Neill has died at age 80

by Catherine O'Neill

Professor O’Neill, a retired Distinguished Professor from Rutgers University, wrote more than a dozen books on subjects such as women, politics, and war in the United States in the Twentieth Century.