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: John Q. Barrett at the Jackson List
Jun 14, 2010
[John Q. Barrett is professor of law at St. John's University School of Law.]
On behalf of Chautauqua Institution and the Robert H. Jackson Center, I am pleased to announce that historian, presidential speechwriter and author Jeff Shesol will deliver Chautauqua Institution's sixth annual Robert H. Jackson Lecture on the Supreme C
Source: CHE
Jun 14, 2010
The University of California at Irvine has suspended the campus's Muslim Student Union for one year and placed the group on disciplinary probation after members of the group repeatedly interrupted a campus speech in February by Israel's ambassador to the United States, according to a letter released on Monday.
The hecklers shouted down the ambassador, Michael Oren, at times calling him a "killer" and scuttling parts of the speech. Video of the event drew international atte
Source: Chicago Journals
Jun 13, 2010
The University of Chicago Press is pleased to announce the award of the 2011 Catharine Stimpson Prize for Outstanding Feminist Scholarship to Ellen Samuels, Assistant Professor of Gender and Women’s Studies and English at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Named in honor of the Founding Editor of Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, the Catharine Stimpson Prize is designed to recognize excellence and innovation in the work of emerging feminist scholars.
Professor Sam
Source: PR Newswire
Jun 11, 2010
Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced today that Dr. Robert V. Remini, the House Historian, has chosen to retire from the post on August 31. Dr. Remini has served as Historian for the past five years, having reestablished the office in 2005.
"Dr. Remini has been a tremendous asset to the House of Representatives," Speaker Pelosi said. "It has been an honor to have so distinguished an historian serving the House for the past five years. He has worked diligently to initiate
Source: Newsweek
Jun 11, 2010
...[W]e asked presidential historians to help us speculate as to how the past five U.S. presidents would have handled the BP oil spill if they were still in office. The question isn’t who would cap the leak quickest —all of them would have been at the mercy of BP—but, rather, how their leadership styles would have guided their responses, and what lessons Obama can learn from them....George W. Bush: The Crowd Reader
Timothy Naftali, director of the Richard Nixon Li
Source: Inside Higher Ed
Jun 11, 2010
Some prominent liberal academics are soliciting short essays from faculty members and graduate students to document a pattern in American history of major social advances being opposed by conservatives who "cry wolf" about the impact of proposed reforms. The campaign -- known as the "Cry Wolf Project" -- hasn't been officially announced. But conservative bloggers obtained some of the solicitations of essays and published them this week, along with considerable criticism.
Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jun 11, 2010
So what should we make of Barack Obama’s rise to the presidency? And what does his journey tell us about the United States and how the country’s attitudes about race have evolved?
Since Obama’s candidacy began, a barrage of writers and pundits have been trying to answer those questions. Now author William Jelani Cobb, an associate professor and chair of the history department at Spelman College, tries to tackle them in his new book, “The Substance of Hope: Barack Obama and the Parad
Source: University of Chicago
Jun 9, 2010
Angela Gugliotta, a beloved teacher of environmental history whose research challenged the categorical distinction between natural and social knowledge, died June 1 after a ten-year battle with breast cancer. She was 47.
Funeral services were held Monday at St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Hyde Park before an assembly of over two-hundred and fifty, including many students and faculty members from departments across the University.
Gugliotta served as Lecturer in the Col
Source: NYT
Jun 9, 2010
Even among the nation’s most febrile political contests, few choices are as stark as the one Nevada voters will make between a circumspect four-term senator, one of the most visible emblems of Democratic power in Washington, and a largely unknown former state lawmaker with 10 grandchildren, whose fondness for weightlifting and for her .44 Magnum won the ardor of the Republican Party base....
“Angle can beat Reid if she can avoid being defined as too right-wing even for conservatives
Source: NYT
Jun 9, 2010
Before the news conference at Queens Borough Hall on Tuesday, Jack Eichenbaum, the newly minted borough historian, pulled fliers from his backpack and handed them out.
The fliers advertised his walking tours around his native Queens, including one scheduled that evening, from Long Island City to Old Astoria.
Mr. Eichenbaum, 67, a retired city assessor with a Ph.D. in urban geography, beat out six other candidates to join the ranks of official New York historians. He fol
Source: Andrew Breitbart Presents Big Hollywood
Jun 9, 2010
Many conservatives and libertarians think of labor unions as merely the grassroots muscle behind the progressive movement. Showing up as a swarm of purple shirts, with the forearms of a lumberjack and a penchant for terrorizing teenagers, labor unions have always been considered the rough and rugged group that intimidate their opponents through the “persuasion of power.”
But if you haven’t thought of the labor movement as a cerebral bunch, think again. Meet Peter Dreier, Donald Cohe
Source: Joanna Weiss at the Boston Globe
Jun 9, 2010
[Joanna Weiss is a columnist for the Boston Globe.]
...Even as a thought experiment, refuted by some scientists and futurists and optimists, “peak oil’’ is an opportunity to think past the relative placebo of renewable grocery bags and remember that our oil dependence wasn’t preordained. Early plastics were made from coal resin, says Brian Black, professor of history and environmental studies at Penn State Altoona. Petroleum just made them more malleable and cost-effective. Early ca
Source: Medieval News
Jun 8, 2010
Western Michigan University has awarded the prestigious Grundler Prize to a University of Notre Dame scholar for his book, Sisters and Brothers of the Common Life: The Devotio Moderna and the World of the Later Middle Ages.
The prize was awarded at the 45th International Congress on Medieval Studies May 15 to John van Engen, professor of history at Notre Dame. The Grundler Prize was established to honor the late Dr. Otto Grundler, former director of the WMU Medieval Institute, which
Source: Medieval News
Jun 8, 2010
It was not necessary to be literate to be able to access rune carvings in the 11th century. At the same time those who could read were able to glean much more information from a rune stone than merely what was written in runes. This is shown in new research from Uppsala University in Sweden.
Rune stones are an important part of the Swedish cultural environment. Many of them are still standing in their original places and still bear witness about the inhabitants of the area from a th
Source: David Darlington at AHA Blog
Jun 8, 2010
The American Council of Learned Societies recently announced the winners of its 2010 fellowship competition. Over $15 million was awarded to more than 380 scholars, including many historians. ACLS fellowships and grants are awarded to individual scholars for excellence in research in the humanities and related social sciences. The complete list of winners is available on the ACLS web site. Among the winners are the following historians:
ACLS Fellowships: Karl Appuhn (NYU); Thomas W.
Source: The Hill
Jun 8, 2010
The White House job offers that led to charges the administration is practicing Chicago-style politics are nothing out of the ordinary when it comes to Washington, according to presidential scholars.
Offering someone a position to get him out of the way goes back at least as far as the 1824 presidential election of John Quincy Adams.
“This kind of jockeying happens all the time in politics,” says David Greenberg, professor of history, journalism and media studies at R
Source: Canisius College
Jun 8, 2010
David Valaik, PhD, an emeritus professor of history at Canisius College, died on Friday, June 4. He was 74.
Valaik retired from Canisius in 2004, following 44 years of service to the college. During his tenure, he taught a variety of courses including those on the Progressive Era, military history, the Civil War and Theodore Roosevelt. He also served as dean of continuing studies at Canisius College, for a period of time, and directed the Canisius College ROTC Band.
Val
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Jun 8, 2010
Russia has charged four soldiers with stealing the credit card from one of the victims of April's Smolensk air crash, which killed the Polish president and 95 others, and spending more than £1,000.
The Russian Federal Investigation Committee of the prosecutor's office said four conscripts had been detained for allegedly using the credit card of Andrzej Przewoznik, a leading historian who was killed in the accident.
"Today, four soldiers have been charged with thef
Source: Hendrik Hertzberg at the New Yorker
Jun 7, 2010
[Hendrik Hertzberg is a senior editor and staff writer at The New Yorker, where he frequently writes the Comment, in The Talk of the Town.]An e-mail from Barbara Weinstein, professor of history at New York University:Since history operates on many levels, we always have to remind ourselves where the person is situated when we discuss them historically (as you did Elena Kagan in
Source: HNN Staff
Jun 7, 2010
Recent Controversy
Williams steps down from R.I. Supreme Court
Former R.I. chief justice Williams cited in divorce case involving his ex-driver
