History Archives - Page 20 of 78

History

Thou Shalt Not Be Indifferent

February 5, 2020 • by Ben Stanley

--- Dear friends, I am one of the few still alive of those who remained in this place almost until the very last moment before liberation. My so-called evacuation from Auschwitz began on the 18th of January. Over the next six and a half days it would prove a death march ...

History

The QE2 Bridge and the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) Hangover

A collectively inherited misfortune

February 4, 2020 • by David Anderson

High levels of traffic mean that the bridge is routinely denounced as Britain’s worst section of motorway, although it is in fact technically only an A-road, and not an M: this, according to a helpful attendant at the ‘crossing office’ on the Dartford side, being to permit the passage of ...

The QE2 Bridge and the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) Hangover

Past Present

Moderate Republicans

Past Present Podcast, Episode 214

February 4, 2020 • by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, Nicole Hemmer and Neil J. Young

Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: Where have all the moderate Republicans gone? Neil wrote about Susan Collins and the end of moderate Republicans in his column for The Week. Niki shared Geoffrey Kabaservice’s book Rule and Ruin as the definitive history of moderate Republicans. Natalia discussed Ezra Klein’s recent New ...

History

Thomas Paine’s Radicalism, and Ours

Rights of Man for the 21st century

February 4, 2020 • by Frances A. Chiu

But in truth, many of his principles and propositions can be traced back still further, to the ideas of founding father Thomas Paine in Rights of Man (1791-1792). Although Paine made no mention of either public health care or tuition-free universities during a period when medicine was still in its infancy and ...

New York City

Love and Death on the Streets of New York

Why West Side Story is back

February 3, 2020 • by Julia Foulkes

But that may be about to change. A radically new production of West Side Story will open on Broadway next month. And a new West Side Story movie, directed by Steven Spielberg and using locations in Harlem and Paterson, NJ, is to come to the screen later this year. Urban ...

Love and Death on the Streets of New York

Politics

We Still Need the ERA

How Activists Can Learn From History to Win It This Time

January 29, 2020 • by Katherine Turk

To many older feminists, the ERA remains the unfinished business of the 1970s. Today’s gender justice activists should expect to battle the same coalition of corporations and social conservatives that defeated their predecessors in 1982. But to win this time, they must learn from their own history. The ERA is not ...

Memory

This Atom Bomb in Me

An atomic childhood in Appalachia

January 28, 2020 • by Lindsey A. Freeman

The following is an excerpt, published by permission. My grandfather was an atomic courier…My atomic immersion began when I visited my grandparents as a child and encountered the vibrant matter of Oak Ridge. As an adult, I write about the place to try to untangle its mysteries -- feeling a magnetic ...

North America

Impeachment as National Renewal

Can non-democratic institutions be repurposed for democracy?

January 28, 2020 • by Ian Zuckerman and Daniel Kato

All of these authors recognize that these comparisons have limitations. The 1868 impeachment of Johnson failed to remove him from office -- just as, in all likelihood, Trump will remain president after his impeachment. But the deeper problem is that these celebrations of the political potential of impeachment elide its ...

Migration

I am a Migrant

January 28, 2020 • by Mat Cusick

I moved for the first time with my family when I was three years old, for a typical reason often described as “economic opportunity.” This meant, in my father’s case, an editorial position at the newspaper in the city where he was born and raised -- what is known as ...

Economy

David Brooks & Economic Inequality

Consulting the “Great Books”

January 23, 2020 • by David Lay Williams

Yet in his column published in the New York Times on January 16, entitled “The Bernie Sanders Fallacy,” echoing similar pieces in the past, I had hoped that he would have consulted them for wisdom again. In it he argues that despite the rapid growth of economic inequality in the United States, ...

Past Present

Jeopardy!

Past Present Podcast, Episode 212

January 21, 2020 • by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, Nicole Hemmer and Neil J. Young

Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: Jeopardy! is in the news thanks to its GOAT tournament. Natalia referred to this Smithsonian article about the show’s origin story. In our regular closing feature, What’s Making History: Natalia recommended Sarah Schrank’s new book, Free and Natural: Nudity and the Cult of the American Body. Neil discussed Katie Reilly’s Time article, “Donald Trump ...

History

‘Scenarios of Uncertainty’ in Britain’s steel communities

January 20, 2020 • by Tosh Warwick

In November 2019, it was announced that the most recent manifestation of ‘British Steel’ had been saved following the purchase of the ailing firm by the Chinese Jingye Group. The £70m takeover promises to save thousands of jobs and bring in £1 billion investment. The news brought relief for those ...