Social History Project Research Articles

Remembering Herbert Gutman's Work, Culture, and Society Fifty Years On

Remembering Herbert Gutman's <i>Work, Culture, and Society</i> Fifty Years On

Remembering Herbert Gutman's Work, Culture, and Society Fifty Years On

Remembering Herbert Gutman's <i>Work, Culture, and Society</i> Fifty Years On

From Robert Keayne to Angola, Richard, and Grace: Bernard Bailyn and New England's Place in an Atlantic World

From Robert Keayne to Angola, Richard, and Grace: Bernard Bailyn and New England's Place in an Atlantic World

Women's History and Digital Media: Uniting Scholarship and Pedagogy

Women's History and Digital Media: Uniting Scholarship and Pedagogy Shelley E. Rose (bio) Thomas Dublin and Kathryn Kish Sklar. "Black Women Suffragists."Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600–2000. Alexander Street Press. ISSN 2164-537X (Basic Edition); ISSN 2164-5361 (Scholar's Edition). http://wass.alexanderstreet.com. P. Gabrielle Foreman. Colored Conventions Project. http://coloredconven-tions.org/. "History of Women's Struggle in South Africa."South African History Online. http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/history-womens-struggle-south-africa. In the twenty-fifth anniversary issue of the Journal of Women's History( JWH), historian Claire Bond Potter asks, "Has the Internet made a difference to the practice of women'shistory? If so, what difference has it made?" 1Potter emphasizes the potential and challenges of a range of digital resources for women's and gender history, focusing on matters of access, creation of community, and the role of such "traditional" academic arenas as print journals and the standard of sole authored works in the process. This digital media review essay marks the beginning of a new JWHinitiative, connecting the traditional and digital realms of publishing while enhancing a sense of community among scholars of women's and gender history from diverse backgrounds and career paths. The Journal of Women's Historyjoins such peer-reviewed journals as the American Historical Review, the Journal of American History, Western Historical Quarterly, and Bulletin of the History of Medicinein vetting digital media. In a timely intervention, the historian Cameron Blevins calls for historians to seize and shape the current wave of reviews. He observes that peer-review of digital projects ranges from informal Twitter dialogues and blog posts to print journals and, in his analysis, falls into three general categories: pedagogy and public engagement, academic scholarship, and data and design criticism. 2Limiting a digital media review to only one or two of these categories, however, potentially obscures a major contribution of digital projects. 3This review therefore focuses on the primary strength [End Page 157]of digital media projects: the ability to bridge the gap between scholarship and pedagogy. Currently, many digital media reviews reinforce a false dichotomy between scholarship and pedagogy. The Journal of American History( JAH), for example, sponsored by the Organization of American Historians, began publishing "web site reviews" as early as June 2009 in collaboration with the educator resources site History Mattersjointly sponsored by American Social History Project and the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media. The JAHeditors explicitly name educators as their primary review audience. 4The American Historical Association (AHA) creates a similar separation between digital media scholarship and pedagogy. In 2016, the AHA Todayblog launched the excellent "Teaching with #DigHist" series, edited by historian and high school teacher John Rosinbum, which discusses the use of a range of digital projects in the secondary and university-level classroom. In terms of scholarship, Alex Lichtenstein's 2016 introduction to American Historical Review's "AHR Exchange: Reviewing Digital History," characterizes the AHR'sstrategy of pairing digital media reviews with responses from digital editors as an "opportunity to defend their approach and to clarify how the digital medium made it possible for them to push scholarship in new interpretive directions." 5This distinct focus on scholarly contributions in the traditional journal aligns with the AHA "Guidelines for the Professional Evaluation of Digital Scholarship by Historians," released in June 2015, where the terms "teaching" and "pedagogy" do not appear in the main section "Forms and Functions of Digital Scholarship." 6On the AHA website, however, these scholarship guidelines are found under the site heading "Teaching and Learning," which indicates the need for more focused discussions in the historical profession on the role of digital media projects in scholarship and teaching. Digital media consumers represent a broad audience, including academics who identify strongly with both scholar and educator communities. Early adopters of digital media, furthermore, are cognizant of statistics that reveal significant numbers of K-12 educators utilizing primary and secondary sources made available through large scale projects like German History in Documents and Images( GHDI) and the Library of Congress's American Memory. 7Data from...

Before The Philadelphia Negro: Residential Segregation in a Nineteenth-Century Northern City.

Although some scholars treat racial residential segregation in Northern cities as a twentieth-century phenomenon, recent research on New York and Chicago has shown that black-white segregation was already high and rising by 1880. We draw on data from the Philadelphia Social History Project and other new sources to study trends in this city as far back as 1850 and extending to 1900, a time when DuBois had completed his epic study of The Philadelphia Negro. Segregation of "free Negroes" in Philadelphia was high even before the Civil War but did not increase as the total and black populations grew through 1900. Geocoded information from the full-count data from the 1880 Census makes it possible to map the spatial configuration of black residents in fine detail. At the scale of the street segment, segregation in that year was extraordinarily high, reflecting a micro-pattern in which many blacks lived in alleys and short streets. Although there was considerable class variation in the black community, higher status black households lived in areas that were little different in racial and class composition than lower status households.

The History Textbook, Born Digital

This essay explores how the American Social History Project's work in history education (professional development programs with K-12 and college history faculty, websites, and CD-ROMs) has developed over time. It considers the possibilities inherent in a radically rethought history textbook — grounded in research by Sam Wineburg and others into how people learn about history — to create a new model for history learning that uses digital tools to foster basic literacy, historical thinking skills, and deep understanding and inquiry into historical content.

History, Interactive Technology and Pedagogy: Past Successes and Future Directions

Based on a keynote presentation at the 2012 Canadian Historical Association conference, this paper surveys the state of digital technology and its impact on academic publication and teaching in the contemporary university. Focusing on the dramatic rise of the Digital Humanities in the last few years, the paper examines alternative forms of peer review, academic scholarship and publication, and classroom teaching as they have been reshaped by the adoption of a variety of digital technologies and formats, including open-access, online peer reviewing, use of databases and visualization techniques in humanities work, online journal publication, and the use of blogs and wikis as teaching tools. Examining the digital production and education work of the American Social History Project at CUNY, which he co-founded, and the Interactive Technology and Pedagogy doctoral certificate program that he heads at the CUNY Graduate Center, the author discusses a range of digital projects and approaches designed to improve the quality of teaching and learning in college classrooms.

Preliminary results from voices of the Mada'in: a tribal history and study of one of Baghdad's six rural districts

From July to October 2008, Human Terrain Team Iraq 6 (HTT IZ6) undertook an oral tribal study and social history project in Mada'in Qada, Iraq. During that four-month period IZ6 formally interviewed over forty tribal leaders. At the same time team members participated in humanitarian assistance operations with internally displaced persons (IDPs), as well as regular citizens of the region. In both the formal, elite-level interviews and the participant observations, four major themes became apparent: (1) The tribal law, written or oral, is often generally perceived as codes, covenants, and/or constitutions. (2) The tribal legal system and the tribal courts are an adversarial and remedial/restorative justice mediation system. (3) The Government of Iraq (GOI) is perceived as being under foreign influence. Members of the GOI are commonly referred to as Iranian agents, Iranians, Zoroastrians and/or fire worshippers (Mithraites) by both Sunnis and Shi'a alike. And (4) the dispute between Sunni and Shi'a is predominantly about resources, not religion. The purpose of this article is to describe the task order for the project, describe the oral history project itself, discuss the research challenges that arose in a semi-permissive environment, present the preliminary findings and tie them into the reality of the ongoing Counterinsurgency Operations in Iraq.

Remembering Dr. Gloria Harper Dickinson (1947-2009)

Dr. Gloria Harper Dickinson, a former president, member of the executive council, and leading figure in the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH), head of African American Studies at the College of Jersey, and International Regional Director of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, died of breast cancer on 18 January 2009. Born in Queens, York, on 5 August 1947, she graduated from Hunter High School in York City, received her B.A. in history from City College of York, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in African Studies from Howard University (1978). Dr. Dickinson taught in the public schools of Camden, Jersey for several years. In 1978 she joined the African American Studies faculty at Trenton State College, now the College of Jersey, where she served as an Associate Professor and chair of the department. Dr. Dickinson's academic expertise included Africana literature and religion, black popular culture, women writers of the African Diaspora, and Media and Africana Studies. She lectured and wrote on the novels of African American science fiction novelist Octavia Butler, Nigerian novelist Buchi Emecheta, British anthologist and publisher Margaret Busby, and American novelist John A. Williams. Her analyses of the popular culture and cuisines of Diaspora peoples; the literature, history, and contemporary activities of women of African descent; and the Africana presence on the Information Superhighway have been both informed and enriched through extensive travel in Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, Asia, and North and South America. In 1995 Dr. Dickinson was among the representatives from every continent at the Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing, China, where she spoke about the struggle of women on the African continent to address issues of equal rights for women, domestic and political violence, and female circumcision. The American Embassy in Muscat, Oman (2003) and the American Consulate in Strasbourg, France (2001) hosted Dickinson as Black History Month speaker. She conducted programs for students, military personnel, academics, and Foreign Service officers. As a member of the American Social History Project's New Media Classroom National Faculty, and the Georgetown University Visible Knowledge Project research consortia, Dr. Dickinson's pedagogical work included a research project on the impact of technology and visual images on student learning. She also served as the lead consultant to the Media Classroom/NEH HBCU Learning to Look initiative with Spelman College and Dillard University; hosted the 2001 Digitizing Divas faculty development institute for humanities professionals; developed Media materials for Africana Studies by infusing the latest technologies into Africana Studies curriculum design; and trained educators on methods and materials for introducing technology and Africana Studies into public school and/or university curricula. Her Teaching Africana Studies and Humanities with Technology consultancies have included presentations at the National Humanities Center, University of Maryland College Park, Clark-Atlanta University, Temple University, Howard University, Borough of Manhattan Community College, Millersville University, Bates College, the University of Pennsylvania, and Ecole Normale Superieur in Dakar, Senegal. Dr. Dickinson co-authored the 1990 and 1991 editions of Tougaloo College's Mission Involvement Program textbook; contributed biographical sketches of police officer Margaret Creswell Hiawatha, AME Zion pastor Rev. …

Social Ecology and Oral History Project “Active Education”

The idea of the “Active education” means the opportunity for children to study the surrounding world not only by textbooks or with the help of the sites in the INTERNET (a rather passive action) but also by a direct contact with this world via its active investigation and solution of some concrete problems.This may be the study of environmental contamination and other modern practical ecological problems such as the transformation of the agriculture production resulting from climatic variations or anthropogenic changes of landscapes.

Clark, Heweitt, Rosenzweig, Brier, Brown, &amp; Foner, Eds., Who Built America? Working People And The Nation's Economy, Politics, Culture And Society, Vol. I; Lichtenstein, Strasser, Rosenzweig, Brier, Brown, Eds., Who Built America? Working People And T

Although not technically second editions, the volumes under review are based on the original Who Built America series sponsored by the American Social History Project and authored by Bruce Levine, Stephen Brier, David Brundage, Edward Countryman, Dorothy Fennell, and Marcus Rediker (volume one) and by Joshua Freeman, Nelson Lichtenstein, Stephen Brier, David Bensman, Susan Porter Benson, David Brundage, Bret Eynon, Bruce Levine, and Bryan Palmer (volume two), published in I 989. I have used volumes one and two of the most recent editions to teach both halves of the American history survey course offered at a small liberal arts college in the Midwestern United States. I offer here both my own and my students' experience with and reactions to the texts so that readers might decide whether to adopt them for either American history survey courses or perhaps for a working-class or labor history class.

Liberty, equality, fraternity: exploring the French Revolution

Liberty, Equality, Fraternity offers readers an accessible and lively introduction to the French Revolution that is also grounded in the latest and most sophisticated historical scholarship. It does so through two paths-a book and a companion CD-ROM. The book gives a brief but comprehensive narrative of the Revolution. The CD-ROM offers readers an unprecedented multimedia overview of the Revolution through images, primary documents, and song. Together they introduce readers to the fascinating story of the world's first great revolution. The book, written by Lynn Hunt and Jack Censer, preeminent authorities on the French Revolution, includes selected images and documents from the accompanying CD-ROM, prepared by the authors with the support of the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University and the American Social History Project at City University of New York. Features of the CD-ROM include primary documents (carefully chosen, translated, and placed in their proper historical contexts by a team of historians), songs, maps, and more than 300 images (caricatures, portraits, sculptures, and photographs of artifacts of material culture)-many previously available only to specialists in the field. These hard-to-find images, gathered from repositories in France and the United States, comprise an unparalleled and powerful visual record of the Revolution. Given the centrality of visual artifacts (imagery, symbolism, and print culture) to the history of the Revolution, and the inability of print reproduction to present such images with clarity and detail, the companion CD-ROM will provide an entry into the Revolution unavailable in any other form.

Service-Learning at Dementia Care Programs

Abstract Service-learning courses provide a unique opportunity for students to relate course material to experiences at the service-learning site. Research has identified benefits for the students that include greater civic mindedness, improved self-esteem, and improved attitudes towards members of the group with whom they interact through service-learning. Key to achievement of these benefits is the opportunity for students to interact with the clients they are serving and from whom they are learning. Service-learning students in gerontology courses find themselves interacting with a diverse older adult population that may include poor or wealthy, physically healthy or frail, socially integrated or isolated, and cognitively intact elders or elders with dementia. These students sometimes find relating to and conversing with older adults at their service-learning site challenging, particularly when the elders have dementia. The present paper describes a project designed to facilitate service-learning students' relationships with older adult participants at an adult day service program caring primarily for persons with dementia. The Social History Project involved scrapbook activities designed to increase knowledge of the elders, which students could then incorporate into their conversations with the older adults. Students' knowledge of and comfort in working with elders increased over the course of the project. Recommendations for continuing this project or modifying it for other dementia care programs are provided.

Using inquiry methods to foster information literacy partnerships

By broadening the definition of information literacy to include classroom activities, the Association of College and Research Libraries’ (ACRLs) Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education challenge academic librarians to reach beyond the library to teach critical thinking. This article explains how the American Social History Project’s New Media Classroom initiative fosters active utilization of primary sources on the Web. After placing NMC’s inquiry activities within educational, school librarian, and academic librarian debates, their use within women’s studies classes at Salem State College is demonstrated. It is argued that such activities help academic librarians to achieve parity with discipline faculty members by encouraging librarians to become integrally involved in classroom activities.

I Know It's Only Rock 'n' Roll But They Like It! A Community History, Popular Music, and Public Audiences

The author discusses community history, popular music, and public audiences using a multidisciplinary approach. These themes are discussed with an example from the Colonial Albany Social History Project.

"It'S About People": Social and Labor History in the Classroom

“It'S About People”: Social and Labor History in the Classroom Get access Bret Eynon, Bret Eynon Dr. Bret Eynon is Education Director of the American Social History Project and the Center for Media & Learning, Graduate School and University Center, CUNY. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar William Friedheim William Friedheim Professor William Friedheim teaches history at the Borough of Manhattan Community College, CUNY and has served as the ASHP Faculty Fellow. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar OAH Magazine of History, Volume 11, Issue 2, Winter 1997, Pages 53–61, https://doi.org/10.1093/maghis/11.2.53 Published: 01 January 1997

&lt;bold&gt;Savage Acts: Wars, Fairs and Empire&lt;/bold&gt;. Produced by Pennee Bender, Joshua Brown, Andreas Ades Vasquez, and Stephen Briar for the American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning, the City University of New York; directed by Pennee Bender, Joshua Brown, and Andreas Ades Vasquez; written by Pennee Bender. 1995; color; 30 minutes. Video distributor: American Social History Project, Inc. (212)

&lt;bold&gt;Savage Acts: Wars, Fairs and Empire&lt;/bold&gt;. Produced by Pennee Bender, Joshua Brown, Andreas Ades Vasquez, and Stephen Briar for the American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning, the City University of New York; directed by Pennee Bender, Joshua Brown, and Andreas Ades Vasquez; written by Pennee Bender. 1995; color; 30 minutes. Video distributor: American Social History Project, Inc. (212)

&lt;bold&gt;Heaven Will Protect the Working Girl&lt;/bold&gt;. Executive producer: Stephen Brier. Produced by Joshua Brown; directed by Pennee Bender, Joshua Brown, and Andrea Ades Vásquez. 1993; black and white &amp;amp; color; 28 minutes. Distributor: American Social History Project

&lt;bold&gt;Heaven Will Protect the Working Girl&lt;/bold&gt;. Executive producer: Stephen Brier. Produced by Joshua Brown; directed by Pennee Bender, Joshua Brown, and Andrea Ades Vásquez. 1993; black and white &amp;amp; color; 28 minutes. Distributor: American Social History Project

The New Labor History in American History Textbooks

If the new labor history has not changed the face of American historiography in the past twenty years, it certainly ranks among the discipline's most exciting developments. Focusing on the relationship of workers and working-class institutions to the larger social and political culture, labor historians ranging from Herbert G. Gutman and David Montgomery to Christine Stansell and Mary H. Blewett have broadened definitions of the political, challenged traditional views of how economic structure is shaped, and provided much of the empirical data that has encouraged us to rethink the role of race, ethnicity, and gender in constructing national identity.' How much of this scholarship has crept into textbooks? In this essay, we explore how well the new labor history has been incorporated into seven popular texts used in college level introductory United States history courses. We have not included here the one textbook that is built around working people's centrality to United States history, the American Social History Project's Who Built America? Working People and the Nation's Economy, Politics, Culture, and Society (originally conceived and directed by Herbert G. Gutman), but we heartily recommend it to those who wish to place working people's perspectives at the core of their courses.2

The construction of understanding in a sixth-grade bilingual classroom

In this article, teaching and studenting ore conceived of as performances defined both institutionally and interactionally. Schools are viewed as providing an institutional framework and an organizational definition for teacher and student roles, whereas the actual roles experienced by teachers and students are viewed as interactionally constituted. From this perspective, each school and classroom is a particular kind of setting with particular opportunities for interacting and learning, even though schools and classrooms, as a general class of institutional entity, may share certain common organizational patterns. I present an analysis of how members of a bilingual sixth-grade classroom construct knowledge as they interact within a particular event of a social science history project. This analysis shows how theory informs analysis, and conversely, how analysis informs theory. Data are presented to illustrate ways in which knowledge is constructed by members through interactions in a local event (i.e., the presentation and defense of their island history) and over time (a 2 1 2 -month period). Ways in which positions (institutional definitions) and positionings (interactionally constructed definitions) are established by bilingual and Spanish or English dominant students through their actions and interactions are discussed along with related issues of language use.