history wars

Teaching the History Wars

by Megan Threlkeld

Teaching first-year undergraduates about the recurrent conflicts over their curriculum takes them from not knowing what the "history wars" are to asking challenging questions about what counts as history. 

The History Wars Were Front and Center at the AHA Meeting

Questions raised by a controversial op-ed by AHA President James Sweet inevitably hung over the annual meeting as scholars met amid political attacks from without and debates within the profession. 

Is There a New History War?

by David Frum

David Frum asks what's behind the summer's AHA dustup. 

What's Driving the Latest Texas History Wars?

by John Willingham

An organized and well-funded alliance of charter schools and conservative activists is leveraging the Critical Race Theory controversy in Texas to pursue the real prize: school education funding. 

Lessons from the History Textbook Wars of the 1920s

by Bruce W. Dearstyne

Historians helped defuse a national tempest over allegedly unpatriotic textbooks in the 1920s by explaining the nature of professional historical research, interpretation, and dissemination, and insisting on the right and duty of professionals to exert expertise. That kind of work is needed again today. 

Teaching Slavery to Middle Schoolers Raises Emotions. It's Not a Bad Thing

by Mary Niall Mitchell and Kate Shuster

A new digital project helps teachers use advertisements seeking the return of enslaved people who escaped as a way of understanding the people whose self-liberation forced those stories into the printed record.

Historians Can't Leave the Teaching of History to Politicians

by Walter G. Moss

As a historian of Russia, the author finds today's political interference with history teaching "like Soviet authorities forbidding Soviet history teachers to mention Trotsky’s role in bringing the 1917 communist revolution about."

Opinion: Students Need to Learn About the Haters and the Helpers of our History

by Michele Norris

"We do our children no favors if we only feed them a steady diet of fairy tales that sidestep life’s complexities.... What’s really at work is adults trying to outrun a sense of shame."

Texas Senate Declares War on History

by Julian Zelizer

"Though much of the debate is being framed as being about "Critical Race Theory" -- a term that is politically useful since most Americans have no idea what it means -- it's really about teaching the history of race relations and civil rights."

Culture War in the Classroom: Time for Educators to Go on the Offensive

by Leo Casey

Educators need to fight back aggressively against the CRT panic, which is a right-wing effort to limit teaching and learning about racism in K-12 schools. A civics educator and teacher advocate explains how. 

To Understand the History Wars, Follow the Paper Trail

by James Grossman and Jeremy C. Young

"This is the legislative equivalent of push-polling — creating division where none exists, raising fears about something that isn’t even happening to score political points."

The New York Times Backs-Off a Controversial Claim in its 1619 Project

by John Fea

The New York Times Magazine offers some nuance. It appears that a recent panel featuring Alan Taylor, Annette Gordon-Reed, and others had something to do with this.

What the 1619 Project Really Means

by Timothy Messer-Kruse

Professor Timothy Messer-Kruse argues that critics from both ends of the political spectrum have misunderstood the project.

Victoria Bynum Writes Response to Alex Lichtenstein's Article on the 1619 Project

by Victoria Bynum

Part of the ongoing historical debate. 

Re-Animating the 1619 Project: Teachable Moments Not Turf Wars

by James Brewer Stewart

Those of us who value the 1619 Project can reclaim our “teachable moment” by excavating beneath the heated rhetoric. There we will discover that the journalists and the historians embrace conflicting but equally valuable historical truths regarding slavery’s power to shape our nations past and present.

The Daily Princetonian Publishes Article Summarizing Ongoing 1619 Project Debate

A summary of what different historians have said and how others have responded. 

World Socialist Web Site Publishes A reply to the American Historical Review’s defense of the 1619 Project

by David North and Tom Mackaman

"The fact that the 1619 Project is now being editorially defended in the AHR, despite the withering criticisms of highly respected professional historians, is a very troubling development," its authors claim. 

1619 and All That

by Alex Lichtenstein

"What is odd about the letter is that it implies that the singular problem with the 1619 Project is that journalists are practicing history without a license."

1,056 Feet: Why I Needed the 1619 Project Growing Up

by Derek Litvak

The 1619 Project is not interested in retelling America’s founding story. It seeks to forge a new one. The people who contributed to this effort know full well those like myself, who grew up in the drainage ditches of America, in the long shadow of a bright star, need to hear this history. Demands to “stick to the facts” often sideline or silence our story. 

Twelve Scholars Critique the 1619 Project and the New York Times Magazine Editor Responds

Scholars composed a letter to The New Times Magazine concerning 'The 1619 Project.' The NYTM editor, Jake Silverstein, responded but the NYTM declined to publish the letter and his response. The scholars created a reply and Silverstein had no objection to publishing the exchange in another venue. It is published here.