David Hempton on the Church and the Long Eighteenth Century

Randall Stephens

London, 1808. General Collection, Beinecke Rare Book and
Manuscript Library, Yale University.

The April issue of Historically Speaking includes Donald Yerxa's interview with David Hempton. In July 2012 Hempton will assume his role as dean of Harvard Divinity School. Hempton is a leading historian of religion with numerous scholarly interests, including religion and political culture, comparative secularization in Europe and North America, the history and theology of evangelical Protestantism, and the rise of world Christianity in the early modern period. He has written a number of important and award-winning books, including Methodism and Politics in British Society, 1750-1850 (Stanford University Press, 1984); Religion and Political Culture in Britain and Ireland: From the Glorious Revolution to the Decline of Empire (Cambridge University Press, 1996); Methodism: Empire of the Spirit (Yale University Press, 2005); and Evangelical Disenchantment: Nine Portraits of Faith and Doubt (Yale University Press, 2008). His most recent book is The Church in the Long Eighteenth Century, published in 2011 by I.B. Tauris as part of its History of the Christian Church series.

Donald A. Yerxa: What are you attempting to do in The Church in the Long Eighteenth Century?

David Hempton: This is a general history of worldwide Christianity in the so-called long 18th century (roughly 1680 to 1820). I adopt a consciously global perspective on the identity and manifestations of the church and try to move beyond emphases and topics that are rooted mainly in Europe. In a sense I have written two books for the price of one. Book one seeks to "map" world Christianity in all its manifest diversity—Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, and multiple indigenous varieties. I also try to address the thorny problem of missionary motivation in the early modern period before choosing sites of "encounter" between European Christians and the wider world in North and Latin America, the Caribbean Islands, India, China, and Africa. Book two deals with more conventional themes such as the Enlightenment, the evangelical revival, the rise of religious toleration and antislavery sentiment, the French and American Revolutions, secularization, and much else besides. Even here, I try to offer some fresh interpretations of some much-studied episodes in the history of Christianity.

Yerxa: What are some of the topics that come to the fore in your survey of global Christianity that would not be particularly present in a study of European and/or North American Christianity?

Hempton: One way to answer that question would be to look at how the field of ecclesiastical or church history has changed since, for example, the volumes of the Pelican History of the Christian Church first appeared in the 1960s. The Pelican series has stood the test of time for half a century, but obviously much has changed since then. For example, Gerald Cragg's excellent volume, The Church in the Age of Reason, 1648-1789 (1960), deals mostly with the ecclesiastical history of Western Europe, and especially the intellectual challenges posed by the Enlightenment. Since then, shifts in intellectual culture associated with postcolonialism, postmodernism, and feminism and changes in historical methods ushered in by the growth of social, cultural, and global history have transformed the way we think about early modern religion. In particular, religious encounters between European Christians and native peoples throughout the world can be interpreted no longer merely through the eyes of Europeans. Hence, I deal with complex manifestations of Christianity among indigenous people, slave cultures, and other civilizations. . . . read more at Project Muse>>>

Exploring Family History

Randall Stephens

This weekend NPR featured an interesting story about one scholar's quest to learn more about his family.

Eyre Crowe, Slaves Waiting for Sale, Richmond, Virginia, ca. 1861

"Lawrence Jackson went through most of his life not knowing much about his family history," reports Guy Raz.  Continues Raz:

So he began a search, armed with only early boyhood memories, for his late grandfather's old home by the railroad tracks in Blairs, Va. Jackson describes his journey in a new book, My Father's Name: A Black Virginia Family after the Civil War.

Shortly after Jackson began a search for his roots, he found out his great-grandfather was a slave.

"If you said to me that my father's grandfather grew up in slavery and actually spent maybe the first 10 or 15 years of his life as human chattel, I wouldn't have been able to take that idea so seriously" . . . 

This short segment well illustrates how the past still impacts the present.  A course that deals with 19th century US history might make use of stories like this.  In addition programs like Henry Louis Gates' African-American Lives uncover the past in a very personal way.  What better sense could students get of the significance of history?

I'll admit, I've never incorporated a genealogy project into the curriculum.  Yet, stories like these above make me wonder if it would work.

The Bouncing Boundaries of Europe

Heather Cox Richardson

I have thought a great deal this winter about nationalism. It seems to me that the rise of the internet, international trade, and NGOs begs us to ask whether or not nationalism was a twentieth-century phenomenon that had little meaning before the mid-nineteenth century, and will have little meaning after the mid-twenty-first century. The bouncing boundaries in this video seem to reinforce that suggestion:

Animals in History Roundup

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Jerry Adler and Andrew Lawler, "How the Chicken Conquered the World: The epic begins 10,000 years ago in an Asian jungle and ends today in kitchens all over the world," Smithsonian Magazine (June 2012)

The chickens that saved Western civilization were discovered, according to legend, by the side of a road in Greece in the first decade of the fifth century B.C. The Athenian general Themistocles, on his way to confront the invading Persian forces, stopped to watch two cocks fighting and summoned his troops, saying: “Behold, these do not fight for their household gods, for the monuments of their ancestors, for glory, for liberty or the safety of their children, but only because one will not give way to the other.”>>>

"Modern dogs have 'little in common' with ancient breeds," BBC, May 21, 2012

The cross-breeding of dogs has made it difficult to trace the genetic roots of today's pets, according to a new study.

Scientists from Durham and Aberdeen analysed data from the genetic make-up of modern dogs while assessing the archaeological record of dog remains.

They found that modern breeds genetically have little in common with their ancient ancestors.>>>

"How to Build a Dog: Photo Essay," National Geographic (February 2012)

Scientists have found the secret recipe behind the spectacular variety of dog shapes and sizes, and it could help unravel the complexity of human genetic disease.>>>

Sarah C. P. Williams, "Whence the Domestic Horse?" Science, May 7, 2012

Shards of pottery with traces of mare's milk, mass gravesites for horses, and drawings of horses with plows and chariots:
These are some of the signs left by ancient people hinting at the importance of horses to their lives. But putting a place and date on the domestication of horses has been a challenge for archaeologists. Now, a team of geneticists studying modern breeds of the animal has assembled an evolutionary picture of its storied past. Horses, the scientists conclude, were first domesticated 6000 years ago in the western part of the Eurasian Steppe, modern-day Ukraine and West Kazakhstan. And as the animals were domesticated, they were regularly interbred with wild horses, the researchers say.>>>

Jared Diamond, "What Makes Countries Rich or Poor?" New York Review of Books, June 7, 2012

. . . . Europe has had a long history (of up to nine thousand years) of agriculture based on the world’s most productive crops and domestic animals, both of which were domesticated in and introduced to Europe from the Fertile Crescent, the crescent-shaped region running from the Persian Gulf through southeastern Turkey to Upper Egypt. Agriculture in tropical Africa is only between 1,800 and 5,000 years old and based on less productive domesticated crops and imported animals.>>>

When Is It Time to Stop Teaching Something?

Jonathan Rees

Those of us who teach the second half of the American survey course face a problem that only recent historians ever seem to face: our period keeps expanding.  Until there’s some kind of mass meeting where all we historians decide to move the dividing line in a two-course US survey sequence from 1865 or 1877 to 1900 or something, what counts as 1877 to the Present will only get larger.  This poses some problems for those of us who’d like to keep our courses current.

When I started teaching during the late-1990s, 1989 (with the fall of the Berlin Wall and all that) was a natural time to stop.  A few years ago, I rearranged my entire survey course in order to make it up to September 11, 2001, without actually covering it as everyone I was teaching still remembered it perfectly.  Well, those days have changed.  Listening to my students talk, I realized it was time to recall the events of that day and at least a few of the ones following it because they were barely cognizant of what was happening at that time yet have been living in its shadow ever since.

Besides needing to make room for the near present, I’ve been trying to update some of my other lectures from further back in light of recent scholarship.  When I first started talking about the 1970s, it was all Watergate all the time.  After all, It Seemed Like Nothing Happened was the first book on that decade to come out after it ended.  Jefferson Cowie has absolutely torpedoed that stereotype forever.  I’ve also tried to include some of the absolutely amazing material that’s been written about the rise of conservatism in recent years by people like Kim Phillips-Fein and Bethany Moreton.

My problem, therefore, has not been what to include in the new lectures I’ve been writing.  My problem has been what to cut out.  Cover new ground in any depth and something has to go.  Since I’ve also tried to redesign my course to include less lecturing, some of these cuts have been quite painful.

For example, I used to work for Stanley Kutler.  If you know Stan, you know that he was the first academic historian to write a book about Watergate.  When you get Stan to talk about Nixon, he won’t stop.  Therefore, I picked up an enormous amount of information about Watergate almost by osmosis.  I’ve cut my Watergate coverage down from a lecture all its own to about ten minutes.  It just doesn’t seem as important as it once did, anyway. 

Another subject from the survey class I used to cover in much greater detail is the New Deal.  That was two lectures:  First New Deal in the first one, Second New Deal in the second.  The Depression got a lecture all its own.  It still does, but I’ve got the New Deal down to one lecture by simply admitting to myself that the long string of Alphabet Soup programs that history teachers have been teaching since about the time that Roosevelt died is actually rather boring.  I now cover the programs that I think were crucial (NIRA, Social Security, NLRA, and a couple of others) and let my students read about most of the rest.

Similarly, I used to have one lecture for the Populists and another lecture for the Progressives.  Maybe that’s because I was taught by so many political historians as an undergraduate and graduate student, but I’d rather be talking about scholarship that dates from after I was born, thank you very much.  If I enjoy it, I think they’ll enjoy it more.  Just because you learned it is no reason that you have to cover the exact same material that your professors did. 

Ultimately, I think the question of coverage is the key here.  As Lendol Calder has been saying for years, our survey courses do not have to turn us all into walking encyclopedias.  (In fact, if we do our jobs right many of your students will come back for more in upper-level courses.)  Since covering everything will get even harder as time marches on, perhaps its best to change your approach before defeat becomes inevitable.

Jonathan Rees is Professor of History at Colorado State University – Pueblo.  He blogs mostly about technological and academic labor matters at More or Less Bunk, but still writes about history there every once in a while.

Grades Are In!!!!

Heather Cox Richardson

This is what teachers feel like when the semester finally drags to an end:

Good luck to all of our graduates. We hope you learned as much from us as we did from you.

Was There a Schlieffen Plan?

Steven Cromack

In a 1999 journal article published in War in History, historian Terence Zuber dropped a bombshell on the academic community.  He argued that the Schlieffen Plan, or the German attack plan during World War I, was a post-war construction written by the generals to justify why the Germans lost the war.  He based his argument strictly on not only the primary sources that have been around since the War, but also new sources that became available with the fall of the Berlin Wall.  Zuber’s individual pieces of evidence are circumstantial. Take all of it into consideration, however, and he makes a compelling case.  A few years later, he published a book on the topic with Oxford University Press (Inventing the Schlieffen Plan: German War Planning, 1871-1914).

“The Schlieffen Plan” was the so-called German attack plan supposedly articulated by Count Alfred von Schlieffen, Chief of the German General Staff.  It was Germany’s roadmap to war—if all went according to “the Plan,” Germany would deliberately start World War I on their terms in 1916.  It called for rapid building of railroads across the country from West to East.  The attack would consist of the right wing invading Belgium and swing wide around Paris, striking the city from the West.  The left flank would remain stationary at Lorraine and hold off the likely French counterattack.  In the eyes of Schlieffen, France would surrender before they let anything happen to Paris.  Then, with France out of the war, the German army would utilize their new railroads, move its troops across the country to Eastern front, and knock out Russia.  As history “happened,” when entangling alliances ignited the so-called “powder keg,” and launched the War earlier than the Germans had hoped, the Schlieffen plan fell apart.  Schlieffen died, and his successor, Ludwig von Moltke not only inherited the Plan, but also altered it, or failed to understand it.  Von Moltke moved troops away from the West to bolster the Russian front.  “And the rest,” they say, “is history.”

Zuber challenged that history.  He wrote that there never was mention of a “Schlieffen Plan” before 1920.  Instead, he argued that when one historian wrote that Germany employed the wrong strategy, the generals and other members of the General staff, Kuhl, Ludendorff, Foerster and Groener, countered with the myth that Schlieffen had conveyed his master plan to Moltke, but that Moltke failed to understand it.  One should note that historians base their histories of the war on Ludendorff and others’ accounts.

According to Zuber, Schlieffen did have some contingency plans, although they remained in his possession until he died, and were not locked in the vault with the rest of the German war plans.  Zuber insisted that on its own, the Plan, or Denkschrift was a nightmare, poorly organized, and called for troop numbers that never existed.  Schlieffen’s war games, as evident in his writings and handwritten diagrams, did not resemble the master plan, or anything close to it.  Zuber based this argument on the newly discovered German staff memorandum, prepared by Major Wilhelm Dieckmann.  Dieckmann was a German officer whose task was to write a history of the war, and he therefore had access to many of Schlieffen’s notes, and war plans before Allied bombings during World War II destroyed them.  According to Zuber, Dieckmann’s manuscript revealed that Schlieffen’s “Plan” intended to keep the East strong and hold off the French by defeating their fortification line.  Schlieffen never envisioned swinging wide around the Paris and defeating the French army.  If this is true, then the Schlieffen Plan, as we know it, is wrong.

Zuber’s article and subsequent publications provoked a fifteen-year debate in War in History, especially between himself and historian Terence Holmes of Swansea University.  The debate over whether there was or whether there was not a Schlieffen Plan continues to this day.  The debate, however, has not reached high school history textbooks, or even undergraduate classes on European history.  It seems that historians are having trouble grappling with Zuber’s uncomfortable argument.  Why would they not?  He only insists that the academy has gotten World War I wrong for the last hundred years.  Such an assertion changes the interpretation and sequence of events.  Zuber writes that he seeks “establish German military history according to the standard of Leopold von Ranke: ‘as it actually was.’”  He, therefore, concluded his article, “There never was a ‘Schlieffen Plan.’”

For those interested in the heated debate in War in History thus far, here is the “Roundup” from Zuber’s website (http://www.terencezuber.com/):

T. Zuber, 'The Schlieffen Plan Reconsidered' in: War in History, 1999; 3: pp. 262-
305.

T. Holmes, 'A Reluctant March on Paris', in: War in History, 2001; 2: pp. 208-32.

T. Zuber, 'Terence Holmes Reinvents the Schlieffen Plan' in: War in History 2001; 4,
pp. 468-76.

T. Holmes, 'The Real Thing' in: War in History, 2002, 1, pp. 111-20.

T. Zuber, 'Terence Holmes Reinvents the Schlieffen Plan - Again' in: War in History
2003; 1, pp. 92-101.

R. Foley, 'The Origins of the Schlieffen Plan' in: War in History, 2003; 2 pp. 222-32.

T. Holmes, 'Asking Schlieffen: A Further Reply to Terence Zuber' in: War in History
2003; 4, pp. 464-479.

T. Zuber, 'The Schlieffen Plan was an Orphan' in: War in History, 2004; 2 pp. 220-25.

R. Foley, ‘The Real Schlieffen Plan’ in: War in History, 2006; 1, pp. 91-115.

T. Zuber, ‘The ‘Schlieffen  Plan’ and German War Guilt’ in: War in History, 2007; 1,
pp. 96-108.

A. Mombauer, ‘Of War Plans and War Guilt: The Debate Surrounding the Schlieffen
Plan’ in: Journal of Strategic Studies XXVIII, 2005.

T. Zuber, ‘Everybody Knows There Was a ‘Schlieffen Plan”: A Reply to Annika
Mombauer’ in War in History, 2008; 1. pp. 92-101.

G. Gross, ‘There Was a Schlieffen Plan: New Sources on the History of German War
Planning’ in: War in History, 2008; 4, pp. 389-431.

T. Zuber, ‘There Never was a “Schlieffen Plan” (in preparation)

T. Holmes, ‘All Present and Correct: The Verifiable Army of the Schlieffen Plan’, in:
War in History, 2009, 16 (1) 98-115.

T. Zuber, ‘The Schlieffen Plan’s “Ghost Divisions” March Again:  A Reply to Terence
Holmes’ (in preparation)

Muldoon on "The Roots of Democratic Self-Government"

Randall Stephens

In the latest issue of Historically Speaking (April 2012) James Muldoon considers the "Roots of Democratic Self-Government." It's a timely essay. "The Arab Spring is warming the seeds of democracy that exist in all societies but have remained latent until now" he writes. Muldoon goes on to ask, "If democracy is such a natural phenomenon, what happened to frustrate the democratic expectations of these new societies?" In part he finds the answer in a now somewhat obscure book by Albert Beebe White (1871-1952), "who taught English history at the University of Minnesota for many years." Continues Muldoon:

Near the end of his career he published Self-Government at the King’s Command: A Study in the Beginnings of English Democracy (University of Minnesota Press, 1933), a reflection on lessons he learned from his study of English constitutional development. The most important lesson he learned was that, as the title of his book states, self-government and democracy did not emerge from popular demand. “If the title of this study appears to be a paradox, it is because our thinking is still generally ruled by the notion that wherever self-government has arisen it has been because people have wished to rule themselves and have striven successfully to this end." . . . 

In stressing the role of the Norman and Angevin monarchs of the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries in the creation of English self-government, White was attacking the once popular belief that the English were inherently inclined to democracy, the so-called germ theory of constitutional development associated with Herbert Baxter Adams. 

Why did English kings require the services of their subjects instead of employing full-time paid officials? White suggests that the kings dis- trusted full-time officials such as sheriffs, so they required their subjects to do many tasks performed elsewhere by officials in order to limit the power of the sheriff. It was also cheaper than hiring officials because the services were unpaid and seen as the obligation of the subject. 

The fundamental vehicle for involving the subjects in their own governance was the jury, not the modern trial jury that retains only some elements of its origin but the jury composed of local men brought together to resolve a wide range of problems, criminal and civil. Such juries existed at various levels and called upon a wide range of individuals. There were juries of peasants at the manorial level and juries drawn from the ranks of larger landowners for courts at the county level. . . .

The rest will soon be posted at Project Muse.

Writing and Publishing Roundup

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Bernard Potter, "Publish - and be damned," Times Higher Ed, May 3, 2012

I have greatly appreciated my relationships with several publishers and editors over the past 40 years. Almost without exception, they have been friendly, wise and helpful. . . . It appears that this eager team of publishers never sent my book out for peer review, either as a proposal or as a completed manuscript. (The publisher of my fifth edition did.) At least, they did not deny this on being

questioned about it, and I had no feedback from reviewers. They didn't have my book edited at all, in the sense described above. They probably didn't even read it - showed no sign of it, in any case. They declined to provide any help with illustrations, copyright and permissions. (As a result, the illustrations are dire.) When I requested a small advance to cover the unexpected cost of illustrations, they refused.>>>

Helen Sword, "Yes, Even Professors Can Write Stylishly," Wall Street Journal, April 6, 2012

Of the estimated 50 million academic articles at large in the world today, all too many of them contain prose as "weary, stale, flat" (to quote Hamlet) as a black gown with matching mortarboard.

Consider these two real-life examples (doctored slightly to protect the authors' identities):

The capability of a decision unit to induce innovation is crucial to the attainment of organizational success but can eventuate in oppositional behavior within organizational adoption units.

The continued contestation of authenticity on manifold fronts tends, unsurprisingly, to induce a defensive posture to establish professional authority, which is accomplished by legitimating practice through symbolic representation.

Awash in muddy syntax and obscure vocabulary, such sentences recall the bureaucratic blather that George Orwell once likened to the defensive response of a "cuttlefish squirting out ink.">>>

Emily Temple, "The 10 Grumpiest Living Writers," flavorwire.com, April 25, 2011

This week saw the release of Farther Away, Jonathan Franzen’s newest collection of essays and speeches, covering the last five years of his non-fiction output. Well, in those last five years, he has become increasingly grumpy, griping about things like Twitter and ebooks, and building a reputation as an unrepentantly prickly author with a constant bone to pick. To celebrate the release of another book filled with Franzen’s complaints, we’ve put together a list of the ten grumpiest, crankiest and most cantankerous authors still living today. Click through to read about the exploits of our favorite literary curmudgeons, and let us know — as un-crankily as you can, please — if we’ve missed anyone in the comments.>>>

Teri Tan, "Publishing In Russia 2012: Publishers in a Changing Industry Exploring ways to move ahead while going increasingly digital," Publishers Weekly, March 30, 2012

Despite the economic gloom, the number of titles produced annually in Russia continues to grow. The country is now #3 in terms of book production (approximately 125,000 new titles per year), after the U.S. and China. It also saw more than 20 million e-book downloads and some one million reading devices sold in 2011.>>>

John Bynner and Harvey Goldstein, "Open access publishing should not favour those with deep pockets," Guardian blog, May 9, 2012

The present academic publishing system obstructs the free communication of research findings. By erecting paywalls, commercial publishers prevent scientists from downloading research papers unless they pay substantial fees. Libraries similarly pay huge amounts (up to £1m or more per annum) to give their readers access to online journals.>>>

Popularizing Historical Knowledge Conference, University of South Carolina

Randall Stephens

On the fence about whether or not to attend the Historical Society's 2012 conference?  We have extended the deadline for early registration.  So, head over to the Historical Society site and sign up.  The PayPal setup makes it a cinch to register.

Also, check out the program, with many of the papers now on-line.

Here's a sampling of what will be on offer:

"Popularizing Historical Knowledge: Practice, Prospects, and Perils," University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, Mark Smith, Program Chair

THURSDAY MAY 31

7:30-9:00PM - Belk Auditorium
INTRODUCTION
Lacy K. Ford, Jr., University of South Carolina

KEYNOTE ADDRESS
"Whose History Is It Anyway? Reaching Real People"
Walter Edgar, University of South Carolina

FRIDAY JUNE 1

8:30-10:00am

Session IIB - Room JK
RELIGIOUS HISTORY AND THE PUBLIC IMAGINATION

Chair: John Fea, Messiah College

“Jonathan Edwards Redivivus: Contemporary Reformed Evangelical Uses of Popular History”
Adam S. Brasich, Florida State University

“Rob Bell, News Media, and the Role of Historians”
Charles A. McCrary, Florida State University

“Popularizing the Sacred: Religious History and the Public Imagination”
Jason Wallace, Samford University

1:00-2.30pm

Session IIIB - Room JK
LISTENING IN: MUSIC AND AMERICAN HISTORY

Chair: TBA

“Remixing the Master: Music, Race, and the Central Theme of Southern History Revisited”
Michael T. Bertrand, Tennessee State University

“A Song Is Born (The Public Intellectual)”
Jeff Pennig, Austin Peay State University

Session IIIC - Room 855
POPULARIZING JACKSONIAN AMERICA AND “FRONTIER” HISTORY

Chair: Heather Richardson, Boston College

“Old Hickory Just Got All Sexypants: History and Politics in Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson”
Mark R. Cheathem, Cumberland University

“Moving West: Migrations of a Yankee Family across the Old Northwest, 1780-1869”
Dan Allosso, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

3:00-4:30pm

Session IVC - Room 855
TEXTBOOKS AND THE POPULARIZATION OF HISTORY

Chair: Linda K. Salvucci, Trinity University

“A Most Successful Case of Historical Popularization: R. R. Palmer’s A History of the Modern World”
James Friguglietti, Montana State University, Billings

“Ideology and Education: Economic Education in Texas Public Schools, 1945-1970”
Jeff Hassmann, Lakeview College

SATURDAY JUNE 2

8:30-10:00am

Session VB - Room JK
LEGAL HISTORY AS POPULAR HISTORY

Chair: Deborah Beckel, Joel Williamson Visiting Scholar, Southern Historical Collection

“Abraham Lincoln’s Suspensions of Habeas Corpus in Public and Scholarly Memory”
Robert Faith, Indiana University of Pennsylvania

“Between Evidence, Rumor, and Popular Perception: Marshal Lamon and the “Plot” to Arrest Chief Justice Taney”
Phillip W. Magness, George Mason University

“The Politics of Habeas during the Civil War and Reconstruction”
Justin J. Wert, University of Oklahoma

“General Thomas Ewing’s Infamous Actions Hostile to Civil Liberties: General Order Numbers 10 and 11”
Timothy C. Westcott, Park University

Session VC - Room 855
POPULAR HISTORY, WOMEN’S HISTORY

Chair: Chris Beneke, Bentley College

“Traveling from the 18th to the 20th Century with Dorothy Quincy Hancock, Margaret Fuller, Sally Baxter Hampton, and Edith Nourse Rogers”
Marcia Synnott, University of South Carolina

“Knowledgeable Human Capital and Education in the Eisenhower Administration: The Role of Women”
Erwin V. Johanningmeier, University of South Florida

3:00-4:30pm

Session VIIIB - Room JK
THE POPULARIZATION OF HISTORY IN BRAZIL

Chair: Martin J. Burke, CUNY Graduate Center

“The Magazine Revista de História: A Brazilian Model of Scientific Spreading”
Luciano Figueiredo, Universidade Federal Fluminence

“The TV Show/Youtube Channel Leituras da História as an Example of Scientific Accountability”
Oldimar Cardoso, University of Augsburg


Session VIIIC - Room 855
LITERATURE AND THE WRITING OF HISTORY

Chair: TBA

“Links in the Chain: William Styron and the Creation of History”
R. Blakeslee Gilpin, University of South Carolina

“The History Behind the Poetry of Natasha Trethewey”
Daniel Littlefield, University of South Carolina

“Confronting and Correcting the ‘Cheap, Popular Edition’: Hemingway, Dorman-Smith, and the Chivalrous Quest for Historical Truth”
Ken Startup, Williams Baptist College

6:00-7:30pm - Top of Carolina
RECEPTION

7:30-9:00pm - Belk Auditorium
CHRISTOPHER LASCH LECTURE
"The Politics of Dead Knowledge: What If the Death of History Is a Suicide?"
Jane Kamensky, Brandeis University

Roundup on the History Profession and Historians at Work

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Theo Emery, "Map’s Hidden Marks Illuminate and Deepen Mystery of Lost Colony," NYT, May 3, 2012

For centuries, the Tidewater coast of North Carolina has held one of early America’s oldest secrets: the fate of more than 100 English colonists who vanished from their island outpost in the late 1500s. . . .

The shroud of mystery may finally be lifting. The British Museum’s re-examination of a 16th-century coastal map using 21st-century imaging techniques has revealed hidden markings that show an inland fort where the colonists could have resettled after abandoning the coast.>>>

John Fea, "Some Thoughts on David Barton's Appearance on the Daily Show With Jon Stewart" Way of Improvement Leads Home, May 2, 2012

About one year ago, David Barton, the Christian Right activist and politician who writes about the past, appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.  I blogged extensively about his appearance.  You can read the multi-part series here.

Last night Barton was back on The Daily Show to promote his new book, The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You've Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson.  Here are a few of my thoughts about the interview (and the extended web interview).>>>

William Cronon, "Breaking Apart, Putting Together: Analysis or synthesis: which should we prefer?" Perspectives on History (May 2012)

Is it better to explore tightly bounded specialized topics by asking small unasked questions that can be answered as rigorously as possible, combining previously unknown primary documents and technical arguments in original ways whether or not they ultimately matter very much? Or is it better to range widely across the historical landscape, borrowing insights from secondary sources to make large claims, relying even on documents everyone already knows to pursue big familiar questions which however unanswerable, we all recognize to be undeniably important?>>>

Lincoln Mullen, "Reading ‘History as a Literary Art,’" Chronicle blog, April 30, 2012

When I was an undergraduate taking a class on writing history, and again when I was a graduate student, a professor assigned me to read Samuel Eliot Morison’s essay “History As a Literary Art.” Morison, more than most, was a credible source of writing advice. When he wrote the essay in 1946 he had already won the Pulitzer Prize for his biography of Christopher Columbus, Admiral of the Ocean Sea. By the end of his life, he would pick up another Pulitzer and two Bancroft Prizes. Morison was a professional historian, but he wrote squarely in the tradition of amateur, literary historians like Francis Parkman—perhaps unsurprisingly, since both were Boston blue bloods.>>>

Audrey Williams June, "Aging Professors Create a Faculty Bottleneck: At some universities, 1 in 3 academics are now 60 or older," Chronicle, March 18, 2012

When Mary Beth Norton went to work at Cornell University in 1971, she was the history department's first female hire. But now the accomplished professor has a different mark of distinction: She is the oldest American-history scholar at Cornell.>>>

Pledging Allegiance to the American Flag

Steven Cromack

Did you ever wonder why children in America pledged allegiance to the American flag?  The story actually begins in Boston.  1892 was the four-hundredth anniversary of Columbus’s discovery of the New World.  That year, two Bostonians embarked on a mission to use their paper and the event as an opportunity to put flags in schoolhouses across the country. 

Puck Magazine, 1902.

A Boston businessman by the name of James Upham owned the magazine Youth’ s Companion, which featured serials and other stories for youngsters and families.  At the time, it commanded a circulation of 500,000.  In 1891, Upham began using the magazine to sell American flags to schools. It worked.  By the end of that year, the magazine had sold 25,000 flags.  During the same year, he also petitioned the governing board of the Columbian Exposition for a day to celebrate the founding in schools.   The board agreed that it would be a good idea, provided the federal government would approve it.  Upham then went to Washington to petition Congress and the President.

Because of Upham’s efforts, in July of 1892, President Benjamin Harrison declared that October 21, 1892 would be a national day of celebration:

The system of universal education is in our age the most prominent and salutary feature of the spirit of enlightenment, and it is peculiarly appropriate that the schools be made by the people the center of the day's demonstration. Let the national flag float over every schoolhouse in the country and the exercises be such as shall impress upon our youth the patriotic duties of American citizenship.

In preparation for the event, Upham hired Francis Bellamy, a Christian socialist to write a pledge for the students to recite as part of the October ceremony.  Yes, that’s right, a socialist wrote the Pledge of Allegiance.  In its original form, students were supposed to raise their right arm in the air as a form of salute and recite:
   

I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Southington, Connecticut school children
pledging their allegiance to the flag, 1942,
Library of Congress.

After a few short years, many states passed legislation that required students in the public schools to recite the Pledge.  In the wake of World War I, however, and against the backdrop of a rapid influx of immigrants to the United States, many became concerned that America’s heritage and cultural identity were at stake.  In 1923, adults from across the nation converged on Washington D.C. and held the first annual National Flag Convention.   People had become not only concerned about the lack of attention the Pledge was getting, but also, that many immigrants would use the words “my flag” to maintain allegiance to their home flags.  The people at the Convention resolved to amend the Pledge to read:

I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

A year later, the next Convention added the words “of America.”

In 1939, as war raged in Europe and images began to appear of the Hitler salute, the Sons of the American Revolution began pressuring Congress to adopt an official set of flag rules and etiquette for ceremonies.  Outraged by the schools’ compulsory flag salute and pledge recitation some began to challenge its legality.  As a result, the Supreme Court struck down compulsory pledge recitation during the school day in Minersville School District v. Gobitis (1940). 

In the wake of Pearl Harbor and American nationalism, Congress responded to public pressure by passing the Flag Code in 1942, changing the salute to a hand over the heart.  As far as flags in the schools were concerned, the Flag Code only mandated the display of the American flag during the school day.  While the Pledge was no longer mandatory, many schools continued to start the day with an optional recitation, keeping in line with an already well-established tradition.  In addition, after Pearl Harbor everyone was proud to pledge allegiance to their flag.