Category: Historiography

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“What, to the Slave, Is the Fourth of July?”

Two books

Frederick Douglass, the nineteenth-century orator, abolitionist, and escaped slave, is a hero of our country. Many biographies of him have been written, one of them a Pulitzer Prize winner; at least six books deal with his relationship with Abraham Lincoln; and a book has even been devoted to one famed speech of 1852, “What, to the Slave, Is the Fourth of July?”

Douglass is not famous only for his eloquence, but also because of his long years of political activity in which his unfailing message was that the United States could and should carry out the promises of the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. That message did not end when the Civil War ended.

But for a long time Douglass and his message were eclipsed by history. The purpose of this post is, in addition to honoring Douglass on the Fourth of July, to explain why Douglass’s fame faded for more than half a century. At the same time, I recommend two books that will clarify this further. One is a short biography by Timothy Sandefur; the other is David Blight’s massive Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory.[1] Continue reading ““What, to the Slave, Is the Fourth of July?””

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Why Do We Have Wars? Part II

Map of Eastern Europe

The invasion of Ukraine may give us some insight into the causes of war, with the help of experts.

I recently shared Jeremy Black’s view of why wars happen.[1] High on his list are two explanations: humans are inherently warlike and we idolize war heroes.  But after I wrote about Black, I was urged (by Mark Brady) to read a more classic treatment by Geoffrey Blainey, a prominent Australian historian. He wrote The Causes of War in 1973 and updated it in 1988.[2]

Blainey was not interested in fundamental psychological causes but, rather, in finding specific patterns of how wars get started and how they stop. His book, he said, was based on a study of all international wars since 1700.

Blainey’s most important claim is that war starts when “two nations disagree on their relative strength.”[3] The leaders of each nation weigh their chances of winning or obtaining a goal (which might be maintaining independence). The decision to go to war is based on at least seven factors, he says. Continue reading “Why Do We Have Wars? Part II”

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Can Historians Save Us from ‘Woke’ Culture?

New York Public Library

These days, many people are claiming that the United States is composed of two groups, oppressors and victims.

We see this in university  “whiteness studies,” which treat white people as inevitable oppressors and black people as inevitable victims. We see it in the New York Times’ “1619 Project,” which claims that the true founding of the United States was not 1776 but 1619, when the first African slaves (or possibly indentured servants) arrived at Jamestown, Virginia. Much of “cancel culture” is based on the ideas that white people are guilty for the sins of their ancestors and people of color remain victimized today.

Yet academic historians, by and large, do not look at race this way. And I am not talking just about conservative historians. I mean historians of all perspectives, including historians on the Left.

Why? Because historians direct their attention to “agency.” Continue reading “Can Historians Save Us from ‘Woke’ Culture?”

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My Wishful Thinking, Deflated

Castle on a hill

Some research projects just don’t pan out. I’m going to tell you about one of mine.

Several years ago, for a course on the High Middle Ages, I decided to study primogeniture—the custom of handing property and titles down to the elder son (if there is a son). Primogeniture expanded across Europe in the Middle Ages. In many cases it replaced  partible inheritance, in which property was divided among offspring, with daughters sometimes included.

My hypothesis was that primogeniture contributed to Europe’s distinctive development and thus to the Industrial Revolution. Continue reading “My Wishful Thinking, Deflated”

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Rebel with a Cause

Nefertiti

I was a child when I learned about an unusual Egyptian pharaoh, Akhenaten. He worshipped a single god, Aten, the sun god. And unlike previous pharaohs, he brought to Egypt a more natural style of carving and sculpture, so different from the rigid, flat poses typical of Egypt’s past. (The carving above is of his wife, Nefertiti.) To many Americans in the 1950s, Akhenaten represented a foreshadowing of the monotheism to come, with perhaps a forewarning of Martin Luther as well, as Akhenaten was a rebel against the priestly establishment of 1350 B.C.

I have become reacquainted with Akhenaten while auditing a course in ancient Mediterranean civilizations at North Carolina State. It turns out that while Akhenaten’s impact on Egypt was fleeting, he has fascinated people, especially Europeans, for the past two hundred years.  “The Akhenaten myth . . . is a unique barometer exploring the fascination of the West with ancient Egypt,” writes a historian Dominic Montserrat. [1] Even Sigmund Freud was fascinated by Akhenaten. Continue reading “Rebel with a Cause”