Roundup: Talking About History

February 7, 2004

Outrage at the History Channel for Running a Documentary that Claims LBJ Killed JFK

From an interview on CNBC (Feb. 5, 2004):ALAN MURRAY, co-host: Welcome back to CAPITAL REPORT. Former aides to President Lyndon Johnson are demanding an investigation of a controversial documentary that aired on The History Channel called "The Guilty Men." It aired in November. It suggests that Lyndon Johnson was involved in the assassination of President Kennedy. Joining us now is one of those former aides to President Johnson: Ja

February 6, 2004

Why the History of Black Women--Often Overlooked--Is Important

Interview with Darlene Clark Hine published in Ebony (March 2004): 1. The history of Black women has been long overlooked. How can we make 'His-story' 'Her-story' and Our story? It is important to recognize that the study of Black women's history, in addition to the study of Black men's history, makes for a much more inclusive, richer, fuller and much more truthful African-American History -- or in other words "OUR" story.   2. What

February 6, 2004

Colorado Hearing: Evidence that History Professors Are Biased

From frontpagemag.com (Feb. 6, 2004): Last June, David Horowitz visited Colorado and suggested to lawmakers that an Academic Bill of Rights was needed to protect students from faculty abuses. In the months that followed, Students for Academic Freedom

February 6, 2004

The Clash Over Middle East Studies

Jennifer Jacobson, writing in the Chronicle of Higher Education (subscribers only) (Feb. 6, 2004): Brandeis University plans to open a Center for Middle East Studies this fall that, officials there say, will be free of bias. It will not be solely focused on the Arab-Israeli conflict, which is what most centers pay attention to, says Jehuda Reinharz, the university's president. And it

February 6, 2004

Historians Still Debating What Fueled the Survival of the USSR

Alice Gomstyn, writing in the Chronicle of Higher Education (subscribers only) (Feb. 6, 2004): During the cold war, a debate flourished among American scholars studying Russian history: What fueled the survival of the Soviet regime? Unlike the two superpowers themselves, the opposing sides waged no proxy wars. They fought each other with the tenacity of babushkas on a bread line, armed with dueli

February 6, 2004

How Ray Allen Billington Picks the Movies Listed as Historic by the Library of Congress

Randy Kennedy, writing in the NYT (Feb. 5, 2004):It is a little strange to listen to James H. Billington, the librarian of Congress, as he sits in his office with its commanding view of the United States Capitol and talks of his affection for "National Lampoon's Animal House," the movie that immortalized toga parties and throwing up on the dean's desk."It's an enormously funny movie," said Dr. Billington, a distinguished historian who taught at Princeton and who looks vaguely like the movie's beleaguered Dean Wormer.As a smile stole across his face, Dr. Billington, 74, added,"Belushi going down that food line sort of spoofed a whole way of life."

February 5, 2004

CIA's Refusal to Disclose Its Budget from Half a Century Ago Suggests It Has Something to Hide

Steven Aftergood, writing in the newsletter, Secrecy News (Feb. 5, 2004):It is methodologically difficult for an outsider to pronounce a final judgment on the quality and integrity of CIA intelligence analysis regarding recent events. As Agency defenders are quick to point out, critics lack access to the full record on which a fair judgment should be based.But one can deduce a lot about the intellectual rot at CIA by observing how the Agency stubbornly opposes declas

February 3, 2004

Why Jamestown Is at the Crossroads of Black & White History

Mark St. John Erickson, writing in dailypress.com (Feb. 1, 2004): In the history of the American people, many places are precious. But none reaches back so far - or did so much to shape the nation's identity - as the first permanent English settlement at Jamestown. Twelve years after the first colonists landed in 1607 - and a year before the Pilgrims stepped ashore at Pl

February 3, 2004

Carter Woodson: Founder of Black History Month

Darrell Bowling, writing on MSNBC (Feb. 2, 2004): As children, we joked that the only reason February was chosen was because it is the shortest month of the year. The truth is, February was chosen because of the tremendous number of African-American pioneers and institutions born in this month -- from W.E.B. Du Bois and Langston Hughes to the NAACP and the first Pan African Congress. And the answer to the question"Who i

February 3, 2004

The New Approach in Biography

Michiko Kakutani, writing in the NYT (Jan. 30, 2004): In the last decade and a half, a new genre of scholarship has begun to flourish. You could give it a fancy name like biographical deconstruction, but what it amounts to, simply, is this: a reappraisal of how successive generations of critics, biographers and fans mythologize the achievements and life stories of iconic artists. Gary Taylor'

February 3, 2004

The "Arabs" Who Aren't Really Arabs at All

David Yeagley, humanities teacher at the College of Liberal Studies, University of Oklahoma, writing in frontpagemag.com (Feb. 2, 2004): People in the Arabic world have forgotten who they are. The people of Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and even some"Palestinians," are not Arabs at all. Instead, they are descendents of very ancient peoples, with different cultural and ethnic origins. Militant Arabs invaded these lands

January 31, 2004

With the Internet, Every Man's His Own Historian

Edward L. Ayers, author of The Presence of Mine Enemies: War in the Heart of America, 1859-1863 and professor of history at the University of Virginia, where he created the Valley of the Shadow Project, writing in Newsday (Jan. 25, 2004):Unlike any medium before - from books and museums to film and television - the World Wide Web is profoundly changing our relationship to history. Unlike a museum, the Web is open all the time to peop

January 31, 2004

On the 100th Anniversary of the Japanese Attack on Russia, Japan Still Wondering If War Was Defensible

Hiroyuki Fuse Yomiuri Shimbun, writing in the Daily Yomiuri (Tokyo) (Jan. 29, 2004):Through a break in rain clouds, mountains on the Korean Peninsula emerged on the shore. Through my binoculars, I saw a flapping flag placed above the foremast of a large vessel that is sailing along the coast. Located in the northwest of the Tsushima islands in Nagasaki Prefecture, Mt. Eboshi faces the Korea Strait. From the top of the mountain to the S

January 30, 2004

Samantha Power Takes the NYT to Task over Its Supposedly Evenhanded Account of the Armenian Massacre

From a letter to the editor of the NYT: To the Editor: "Movie on Armenians Rekindles Flame Over Turkish Past" (Arts pages, Jan. 20) says"Turkish and Armenian historians have given widely differing accounts of what happened in 1915." But that is not a matter of ethnic perspective. The extermination of the Armenians is recognized as genocide by the consensus of scholars of genocide and Holocaust worldwide. The failure to acknowledge this trivializes a human rights crime of enormous

January 30, 2004

Pro and Con: Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ

From CNN (Jan. 23, 2004): ZAIN VERJEE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR : Welcome to Q&A. Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" has been applauded for its portrayal of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. But it's also been criticized for fueling bigotry and anti-Semitism and for opening up old wounds that were on the way to being healed. It's an old debate, but now it could begin anew.With us from Orlando in Florida is Ted Haggard. He

January 30, 2004

Egregious Examples of Sloppy Thinking Mar Georgia's New History Standards

Clifford Kuhn, professor of history at Georgia State University, writing in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Jan. 30, 2004):As a scholar of American history, as a professor to many teachers-in-the-making and as a parent of two children who have gone through the public schools, I have a deep, abiding interest in how history and social studies are taught and learned.

January 27, 2004

McNamara Reveals Himself in New Documentary

Writer and filmmaker Geoffrey Dunn, reviewing the Fog of War in Metro, Silicon Valley's Weekly Newspaper (Jan. 2004): The Fog of War opens with a classic McNamarism. As the octogenarian is getting seated for another interview session, he checks in with Morris about sound levels, then declares:"Now I remember exactly the sentence I left off o

January 23, 2004

The Most Important Case Ever Decided by Any Court Began with a Petty Dispute Over a Patronage Job

Michael J. Glennon, a professor of international law at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, writing in the Wilson Quarterly (Summer 2003): The most monumental case ever decided by any court in any country began as a petty dispute over a patronage job. The underlying controversy quickly blossomed into a clash between two titans of the early American republic, and it ended with the unveiling of a new judicial doctr

January 23, 2004

The Ongoing Whitewash of Israel's Attack on the USS Liberty in 1967

George Beres, in an article submitted to HNN on January 16, 2004. (Mr. Beres served three years on Oregon's Interreligious Committee for Peace in the Middle East. He also has been a member of the Oregon Greek Orthodox Committee for Peace & Justice.)History becomes painfully vivid when it deals with violent death-- especially when the reason for death remains a matter of dispute decades later. That was the uncomfortable setting when a U.S. Naval inquiry in early January w

January 23, 2004

Historians in Asia Debate the Sino-Japanese War ... But Run into Political Divisions

Brad Glosserman, director of research at Pacific Forum CSIS, in the South China Morning Post (Jan. 15, 2004):For most Americans, the second world war began on December 7, 1941, when Japanese forces attacked Pearl Harbour. Europeans date the beginning to the 1939 invasion of Poland. Few westerners appreciate the length and savagery of the Sino-Japanese war that was already in full force. More than 50 years after its conclusion, that war