The JuntoCast, Episode 2: The American Revolution

The JuntoCastThe Junto is happy to present the second episode of “The JuntoCast,” our new monthly podcast featuring Juntoists discussing issues related to early American history, academia, pedagogy, and public history. 

In our second episode, Kenneth Owen, Michael D. Hattem, Roy Rogers, and Eric Herschthal use the recent MCEAS conference, “The American Revolution Reborn,” as a springboard to launch into a discussion on questions of periodization, Atlantic and global contexts, the limits of “republicanism,” and the value of recovering “lived experience.”

You can click here to listen to the mp3 in a new window or right-click to download and save for later. You can also subscribe to the podcast in iTunes. Continue reading

Digital Workflow for Historians

So much has changed  in the last few decades, particularly in terms of digitization, in the ways historians access materials, the level and ease of access to those materials, and the methods of delivery for the work that comes from that access. But access is not the only thing that has changed. Working in the digital realm offers historians new tools with which to approach their task, the core of which remains unaffected by these developments. On that theme, I thought I would talk a little bit about my workflow and the tools that I use which allow the work to flow (sorry, couldn’t help myself). Continue reading

#RevReborn, Periodization, and the American Revolution

Two weeks ago, anticipating the McNeil Center’s “The American Revolution Reborn” conference, I wrote a post about my own thoughts on the place (and future) of the American Revolution in the historiography of early America. In that piece, I pointed out that issues relating to causality had gone largely unexplored for a few decades now as attention in the field shifted to the early republic. Both during and after the conference, there has been a substantial amount of internet chatter, from live-tweeting the conference to storifying those tweets to in-depth, panel-by-panel blog recaps. Off the top of my head, I cannot think of another theme-specific historical conference that has gotten this level of internet coverage, though I’m sure some have done. But almost all of the coverage has been about recounting the ideas and themes that came out of the conference, with not much attention given to commenting on them. In this piece, I’d like to comment on one of the most fundamental themes that hung in the air over the entire conference: periodization. Continue reading

The JuntoCast is Here!

The JuntoCastToday, The Junto is happy to present the first episode of “The JuntoCast,” our new monthly podcast featuring Juntoists discussing issues related to early American history, academia, pedagogy, and public history. As we embark on this venture, the first few episodes will be experimental as we try to find the best method for recording a podcast with 3 or 4 participants literally thousands of miles apart. The podcast will appear once per calendar month and the length of the podcast will likely vary anywhere from fifteen to forty-five minutes. As always, any feedback will be greatly appreciated, including suggesting future topics to be covered. Continue reading

The Return of the American Revolution

MCEAS ConferenceLooking forward to attending one of the largest conferences on the American Revolution in a generation this week in Philadelphia, I thought I would take a moment to reflect on the title of the conference—”The American Revolution Reborn“—and its historiographical purchase.

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Teaching Narrative in Graduate School

Word Cloud of Cronon's 2013 Presidential Address

This past Monday I turned in my final paper in a graduate seminar given by John Demos entitled, “Narrative and Other Histories.” I initially registered for the class not long after watching Bill Cronon’s Presidential Address at this year’s AHA Annual Meeting and engaging in conversation about it on Twitter as well as in a piece for The Junto. With all the focus on “storytelling” and narrative as a means for carving out a twenty-first-century model of the historical profession, the course offering appeared quite timely. Continue reading

Guest Post: Working for the Library

Today’s post is by guest blogger, David J. Gary, who received his MLS from Queen’s College (CUNY) in 2011 and his PhD in History from the CUNY Graduate Center in 2013. He is currently an adjunct assistant professor at the Graduate School of Library and Information Studies at Queens College (CUNY). He blogs at Function Follows Forme.

I am grateful to The Junto for this chance to reflect on my experiences earning both a Master’s in Library Science and a PhD in American history and to advocate for others to consider joining me.  Continue reading

Plagiarism, Cheating, and Craigslist

Craigslist adBefore reading this post, take a moment to read this genuine, recent ad from Craigslist (click picture for full size). It is from a student in New York and the assignment(s) are due today, one of which is an early American history paper.

As I wrote last week, I am currently finishing up my coursework and in the fall will begin my first teaching assistantship. Because teaching has been on my mind anyway, the ad above struck me a bit harder than I imagine it would have done before. I’ve heard stories of cheating and plagiarism from my professors and my peers in my own program now in their teaching years, but the ad above really “takes the cake” for me. Continue reading

History Carnival 121

hlogoThe Junto is excited to be this month’s host of the 121st History CarnivalFor those unfamiliar with History Carnival, it is guest-hosted by a different history blog on the 1st of each month and gathers up links to some of the best history blog-writing on the web. Think of it as The Junto‘s “The Week in Early American History” but for a whole month and not limited to early American history.

Let me begin by saying that the process of hosting History Carnival has been quite an enlightening experience. I realize now that I had little perception of just how much history blogging is going on outside of my own field and sub-fields, and, especially, how much high-quality history blogging is being done. Now on to the links…

Reading and Writing the Early American City described its taking part in the exciting new “Just Teach One” project, which gets faculty to agree to teach one of the project’s documents and keep a record of how they used it.

Digesting the Medical Past explored the Victorian obsession with digestion and stomachs, in particular.

Randall Stephen gave tips on turning a dissertation into a book at Religion in American History.

American Orchard tackled the relationship between apples and Puritans.

Over at Chronikos, Greg Rogers looked at the diary and story of Capt. William Rice in “Constraints on Projecting Imperial Power: The Ordeal of William Rice.”

At The Appendix, Carolyn Arena discussed a valuable priest’s diary for sources about women in “Bellette and Yarico: Working Women in the Colonial West Indies.”

Not Even Past has two entries in this month’s History Carnival. The first one looked at both a Muslim slave in North Carolina and the Constitution. The second is actually two itself . . . “Digital History: A Primer (Parts 1 & 2).”

At the VAHS, Jon Weier looks at how World War I affected the YMCA.

While, at Think Shop, Paul Doolan looks at the broader importance of a television interview by a Dutch soldier who fought in Indonesia in which he revealed Dutch atrocities.

The London Sound Survey examines the ties between “street noise” and “the taming of Victorian London.”

Discover Historical Travel does a great job bringing to life the nation’s “worst tornado disaster” in “The Great Tri-State Tornado of March 1925.”

By now, most American historians are familiar with the work of David Barton, a conservative activist who promotes the idea that the United States was founded by (more or less) evangelical Christians as a Christian nation. This month, Robert Tracy McKenzie, chair of the history department at Wheaton College, looked at Barton’s historiographic forebears, discussing Peter Marshall Jr.’s and David Manuel’s highly influential 1977 book, The Light and the Glory.

At In the Service of Clio, Nick Sarantakes expands on a recent Perspectives essay, proposing a clearer distinction between “public history” and “applied history” as forms of engagement with the concerns of people in various walks of life.

In “Globalizing the Nineteenth Century,” Joseph L. Yannielli discusses what “moral maps” reveal about Americans’ and Europeans’ understanding of themselves as part of the world.

Will the history of the Holocaust have to change as the last generation of survivors passes away? And how might that process illuminate the histories of other horrors? At Civil War Memory, Kevin Levin reflects on an editorial by Rabbi Hillel Goldberg, provoking a lively discussion in the comments.

In April, dozens of bloggers celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Old Bailey Proceedings Online, a landmark of digital history scholarship.

At Early Modern Notes, Sharon Howard reflects on some of the project’s useful, and unexpected, implications for scholars.

At medievalfragments, Erik Kwakkel discusses the business of bookselling in medieval Europe, which was more like the modern trade than one might expect.

We’d like to thank everyone who submitted nominations. Next month’s History Carnival will be hosted by Performing Humanity on June 1.

Coursework: How Much is Enough?

Following on from last week’s post by Michael Blaakman, in which he reflected on his experiences preparing for oral exams and their practical value, I would like to take this opportunity to reflect on another aspect of graduate education. Today—two years, four semesters, twelve courses, a couple hundred books, two research papers, and a dissertation prospectus draft later—I am attending the last seminar session of my coursework. Now, it’s nowhere near the equivalent of reaching ABD, but it is something of a milestone, for me at least. I was a non-traditional student who began my undergraduate work at the age of 32 and went straight from undergrad to a PhD program. So today marks the end of what was effectively six years of coursework.

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