This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: City Journal
Aug 19, 2010
[Daniel J. Flynn, author of A Conservative History of the American Left, blogs at www.flynnfiles.com.]
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, as Joseph Stalin entered the final years of his reign of terror in the Soviet Union, twentysomething Howard Zinn served as a foot soldier in the Communist Party of the United States of America—this according to recently declassified FBI files. Zinn, the Marxist historian and progressive hero who died in January, may also have lied to the FBI about
Source: The Root
Aug 19, 2010
Dr. William Jelani Cobb, one of the country's most visible African-American intellectuals, is an associate professor and chair of the history department at Spelman College in Atlanta. His meditation on the hip-hop aesthetic, To the Break of Dawn, is one of the most important texts on this cultural phenomenon.
In his latest book, The Substance of Hope, Cobb turns his attention to the 2008 election, the political climate preceding the election and his own involvement as a delegate for
Source: Stuff (NZ)
Aug 18, 2010
Respected Ngati Porou academic and historian Te Kapunga Matemoana, or "Koro" Dewes, has passed away at the age of 80.
He died from cancer yesterday in Te Araroa.
Mr Dewes was a pioneering educationalist in the 1960s and 70s.
He started in adult education at Auckland University and then laid the foundations for Victoria University's Maori studies department, before returning home to the East Coast and helping form Te Runanga o Ngati Porou.
Source: The Scotsman
Aug 18, 2010
NAZI claims that Hitler was a hero of the Great War have been debunked as a propaganda myth by a Scottish historian.
Throughout his life, Hitler was portrayed as a courageous soldier who fought in some of the fiercest battles of the First World War and was decorated twice with the Iron Cross for his bravery.
But in a new book, Dr Thomas Weber has used material uncovered for the first time in German archives that reveals a dramatically different picture.
Dr Weber
Source: NYRBlog
Aug 17, 2010
On a recent trip to Brazil, I struck up a conversation with Lilia Moritz Schwarcz, one of Brazil’s finest historians and anthropologists. The talk turned to the two subjects she has studied most—racism and national identity....Robert Darnton: Brazil’s emergence as a major world player provokes questions about its national identity, some of them hostile, such as the one you said you encountered on your last trip to the US: How can you live in a country overrun with favelas and
Source: abc.net.au
Aug 17, 2010
A historian studying the life of Ludwig Leichhardt has begun collating findings about the famous explorer.
National Museum of Australia spokesman Dr Darrell Lewis has been tracking Leichhardt's trail through Queensland and central Australia.
Leichhardt and his expedition party disappeared in 1848 and Dr Lewis has been looking for trees marked with an "L" to trace the journey.
Source: NYT
Aug 17, 2010
Bernard M. W. Knox, an authority on the works of Sophocles, a prolific scholar and the founding director of Harvard’s Center for Hellenic Studies, died July 22 at his home in Bethesda, Md. He was 95.
The cause was a heart attack, said his son, MacGregor.
An American born and raised in Britain, Bernard Knox led a life as richly textured as the classics he interpreted for modern readers. After studying classics at Cambridge, he fought with the Republican forces in the Spa
Source: New Yorker
Aug 16, 2010
The historian Sean Wilentz, the author of “The Rise of American Democracy” and “The Age of Reagan,” has a long-standing interest in the songs of Bob Dylan, going back to his childhood in Greenwich Village. His father and uncle ran the Eighth Street Bookshop, an important gathering place for the Beats and other downtown literary spirits; it was in his uncle’s apartment, above the store, that Dylan first met Allen Ginsberg. Wilentz has synthesized his memories, musical impressions, and historical
Source: Washington Times
Aug 16, 2010
Young and strapping, the 57 Irish immigrants began grueling work in the summer of 1832 on the Philadelphia and Columbia railroad. Within weeks, all were dead of cholera.
Or were they murdered?
Two skulls unearthed at a probable mass grave near Philadelphia this month showed signs of violence, including a possible bullet hole. Another pair of skulls found earlier at the woodsy site also displayed traumas, seeming to confirm the suspicions of two historians leading the ar
Source: Boston Globe
Aug 15, 2010
August in New England is the height of tomato season, when fat red beefsteaks, purple and green heirlooms, and tiny, sweet Sungolds beckon at the farmers market. They’re wonderful in crisp salads, as refreshing gazpachos, and all on their own. Perhaps most of all, tomatoes are synonymous with Italian cuisine.
Without the tomato, pizza would be bread and cheese, spaghetti would seem naked. The North End without red sauce? Impossible. But the tomato’s role in Italian food is fairly re
Source: Independent (UK)
Aug 13, 2010
Historians turning their hands to fiction are all the rage. Since Alison Weir led the way in 2006, an ever-growing number of established non-fiction writers – Giles Milton, Simon Sebag Montefiore, Harry Sidebottom, Patrick Bishop, Ian Mortimer and myself included – have written historical novels.
So successful has been the experiment, with many of the books making the bestseller lists, that earlier this year Penguin bought two novels from Kate Williams, one of our finest young histo
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Aug 13, 2010
Professor Ray Beachey, who died on July 10 aged 94, encouraged the hopes of a generation of East African leaders as head of History at Makerere University in Uganda during the 1950s and early 1960s.
A quiet believer in the benefits of the British Empire, he liked to refer to Makere as a crossroads of the world. His students included Benedicto Kiwanuka, Uganda's first prime minister; Yusuf Lule, the country's provisional president in 1979; and Mwai Kibaki, the current Kenyan preside
Source: OAH
Aug 12, 2010
In conjunction with the recently adopted strategic plan, the Executive Board of the Organization of American Historians has enacted a simplified dues structure for individual members. After studying the dues structures of other learned societies, the Board concluded that the organization needed fewer membership categories. The new structure is not only simpler, but creates a lower-priced membership category for professional historian
Source: Rupert Cornwell for the Independent (UK)
Aug 12, 2010
[Rupert Cornwell is Washington correspondent for the Independent.]
I never met Tony Judt but I will miss him, badly. First and foremost of course there's the loss of his historical scholarship, his marvellous books and his evident relish of intellectual combat. Our lives, geographically at least, were also not dissimilar. We both lived for long spells on the continent of Europe before settling, by accident or design, in the US.
Then there were the two dozen or so essays
Source: Mark LeVine for Al Jazeera
Aug 12, 2010
[Mark LeVine is a professor of history at UC Irvine and senior visiting researcher at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Lund University in Sweden. His most recent books are Heavy Metal Islam (Random House) and Impossible Peace: Israel/Palestine Since 1989 (Zed Books).]
New York University (NYU) professor and internationally renowned historian Tony Judt died last week of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, better known in the US as Lou Gehrig's disease after the famous baseball pla
Source: AOL News
Aug 11, 2010
(Aug. 11) -- With illegal immigration an increasingly potent issue, some Republican senators are proposing changes to the 14th Amendment, starting with the first sentence -- the one that guarantees citizenship to anyone and everyone born on U.S. soil, including the children of parents here unlawfully. Nearly 150 years ago, however, it was the GOP that had to fight to get the amendment in place.
When the amendment was ratified in 1868, its citizenship clause was a necessity that deal
Source: Truthout
Aug 11, 2010
For those not familiar with his work, former Army Col. Andrew Bacevich might seem an unlikely figure to spearhead some of the most incisive criticism of American foreign and national security policy available in print. But Bacevich - now a professor of history and international relations at Boston University - has built a career combining his on-the-ground knowledge of military culture with his skill for writing rigorous but accessible analyses like his 2008 bestseller"
Source: BeyondChron (SF)
Aug 11, 2010
The international disability rights movement lost a brilliant leader and great thinker on August 9, 2010 when Paul Longmore died unexpectedly at his home in San Francisco. Longmore, Professor of History and Director of the Institute on Disability at San Francisco State University was a thoughtful and visionary scholar, disability studies pioneer, fierce advocate and role model to many.
In its tribute to Paul, Not Dead Yet has posted a YouTube video of his talk about the disability r
Source: Scott McLemee at Inside Higher Ed
Aug 11, 2010
[Scott McLemee is an essayist and critic. His reviews, essays, and interviews have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Nation, Newsday, Bookforum, The Common Review, and numerous other publications. In 2004, he received the Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing from the National Book Critics Circle.]
While scanning new magazines or newspapers, there are certain bylines you tend to notice. The list of them varies from person to person
Source: HNN Staff
Aug 11, 2010
According to Harold Ramis’s nerdy scientist in the movie Ghostbusters, “print is dead.” That rather grim analysis is becoming the case in our increasingly digitized world. The harbinger of the times is that e-books for the Kindle outsold hardcover books for the first time on Amazon in June. Just because the computer screen is supplanting the printed word, however, does not mean that we are facing the end of publishing. Rather, new technology means new opportunities.C
