History Archives - Page 31 of 78

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On These Truths

History can’t save the world. It can’t even save democracy. But it can offer hope.

May 9, 2019 • by Jill Lepore

Jill Lepore's response was originally published on May 9 2019. The day I sat down to write this essay I got an email from a man in South Carolina. He’d been studying for his U.S. citizenship exam and he’d decided to read my book, These Truths: A History of The United States, ...

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Forming a New Polish Political Consciousness

Part Three: Confronting Polish Responsibility for the Shoah in Paris

May 8, 2019 • by Izabela Wagner

Editor’s note: in two prior essays on the challenges Polish scholars are confronting in their efforts to bring attention to Polish-responsibility for portions of the Shoah, Prof. Wagner discussed the origins of, and the historical and contemporary resistance to, the New Polish School of the History of the Shoah. In this ...

Forming a New Polish Political Consciousness

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National Identities, Popular Histories

Nations are built on both ideals and ugly contradictions – historians have an obligation to both

May 8, 2019 • by Claire Potter

This essay was originally published on May 8 2019. I want to begin with a confession, since it’s always better to admit the embarrassing thing that everybody knows: twentieth century United States historians like me are raised with minimal expectations that become glaringly apparent when we read a book that begins ...

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John Singleton, Anti-Semitism in the New York Times, and TikTok

Past Present Episode 178

May 7, 2019 • by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, Nicole Hemmer and Neil J. Young

In this episode, Natalia, Niki, and Neil discuss the legacy of filmmaker John Singleton, an anti-Semitic cartoon in the New York Times, and the latest social media sensation, TikTok. Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: Filmmaker John Singleton has died. Natalia discussed this article by Singleton in the Hollywood Reporter about whether a ...

John Singleton, Anti-Semitism in the New York Times, and TikTok

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Are American Indians Part of a United States National History?

This land didn’t just used to belong to indigenous nations — it still does

May 7, 2019 • by Malinda Maynor Lowery

This essay was originally published on May 8 2019. I assume I was invited to participate because my field of study is American Indian history, and this book does not cover a lot of American Indian history. So my role here is to talk about how we could and should deal ...

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Why John Dewey Should Matter to Historians

The role of knowledge and truth in the Constitutional order was Dewey’s central project

May 6, 2019 • by David A. Hollinger

This essay was originally published on May 6 2019. These Truths: A History of the United States is the book that Henry Steel Commager tried to write forty years ago, but did not. Commager’s 1979 volume, Empire of Reason, took seriously the Enlightenment foundation for the nation, but his account of the many ...

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The Universal Memoir: An Interview with Nora Krug

The NBCC autobiography award winner on Belonging: A German Reckons with History and Home

May 5, 2019 • by J.P. Apruzzese

In March, The New School hosted this year’s National Book Critics Circle awards, which honor literature published in the United States in the previous year. The awards are presented in six categories -- autobiography, biography, criticism, fiction, nonfiction, and poetry -- and are the only U.S. literary awards chosen by critics themselves. MFA ...

The Universal Memoir: An Interview with Nora Krug

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No ‘Fringe’ About It: An Interview with Arte Público Press

The NBBC award-winning press on publishing Latino authors in the United States

May 4, 2019 • by Virginia Valenzuela

In March 2019, The New School hosted the National Book Critics Circle awards, which honor literature published in the United States in the previous year. The awards are presented in six categories -- autobiography, biography, criticism, fiction, nonfiction, and poetry -- and are the only U.S. literary awards chosen by ...

No ‘Fringe’ About It: An Interview with Arte Público Press

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Writing Life Under Pressure

An Interview with Anna Burns

May 1, 2019 • by Aubrey Moraif

In March, The New School hosted this year’s National Book Critics Circle awards, which honor literature published in the United States in the previous year. The awards are presented in six categories -- autobiography, biography, criticism, fiction, nonfiction, and poetry -- and are the only U.S. literary awards chosen by critics themselves. Milkman is ...

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The One Who Writes Books

Eric Hoffer and the Perks of Being Self-taught

May 1, 2019 • by Marius Stan

We don’t know much about Hoffer’s first decades of life, up to his forties. The only available markers came through his voice only and they were full of inconsistencies. Many biographers have had difficulties with identifying the real pre-Longshoreman Philosopher Eric Hoffer (see Tom Bethell’s Eric Hoffer, Genius—And Enigma). He had ...

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Ancestry.com, Vigilante Border Patrol Groups, and Cargo Shorts

Past Present Episode 177

April 30, 2019 • by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, Nicole Hemmer and Neil J. Young

In this episode, Neil, Niki, and Natalia discuss outrage over an Ancestry.com ad, vigilante groups policing the U.S.-Mexico border, and the controversy over cargo shorts. Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: Ancestry.com released – and quickly pulled – an advertisement depicting a romantic relationship between an African-American woman ...

Ancestry.com, Vigilante Border Patrol Groups, and Cargo Shorts

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Permanent Mystifications

The Story of Post-Conceptual Art in Slovakia

April 30, 2019 • by Max L. Feldman

Prague City Gallery’s “Probe 1: The Story of Slovak (Post)Conceptual Art” (12th December 2018 - 24th March 2019) came and went unnoticed. This is hardly surprising, despite the prime location of the museum’s 13th-century Stone Bell House site: a corner of the Old Town Square beneath the piercing spires of the Church ...