Reporting from the SHA: “(Re)Constructing an Empire: The South and the Nation after the Civil War”

Reporting from the SHA: “(Re)Constructing an Empire: The South and the Nation after the Civil War”

Panelists were Courtney Buchkoski (University of Oklahoma), “Lessons from Kansas: The New England Emigrant Aid Company and Imperial Projects in the Reconstruction Era;” Evan Rothera (Sam Houston State University), “The Complete Triumph of National Arms in the Cause of the Republican Constitutional Government: Anti-Imperialism and U.S./Mexico Relations;” and Cecily Zander (Pennsylvania State University), “The Great Task Remaining: The Reconstruction-Era Army in Texas.”

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Reporting from the SHA: “Championing Justice and Rejecting White Supremacy: The Public Role of Southern Historians?”

Reporting from the SHA: “Championing Justice and Rejecting White Supremacy: The Public Role of Southern Historians?”

This roundtable discussed the role of historians in countering bad historical interpretation and supporting a narrative that challenges white supremacy in our current society. Presiding was Redell Hearn of the Mississippi Museum of Art and Tougaloo College, and panelists were John Hayes (Augusta University), Robert Luckett (Jackson State University), Anthony Dixon (Bethune-Cookman University), and Rachel Stephens (University of Alabama).

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Reporting from the SHA: Arrivals and Departures: Unionists, Confederates, and Occupiers in the Deep South During the Civil War

Reporting from the SHA: Arrivals and Departures: Unionists, Confederates, and Occupiers in the Deep South During the Civil War

Panelists were Clayton J. Butler (University of Virginia), “‘We Are True Blue’: White Unionist Regiments in the Deep South during the Civil War”; Stefanie Greenhill (University of Kentucky), “‘Yankee Skedadlers’: Unionism, Displacement, and Native Northerners who fled from the Confederacy”; and J. Matthew Ward (Louisiana State University), “‘To Rid the Community of All Suspicious Persons’: The Confederate Community in Civil War Louisiana.”

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Reporting from the SHA: Northern Civilians and the Occupied Wartime Confederacy

Reporting from the SHA: Northern Civilians and the Occupied Wartime Confederacy

In this panel presented at the 2018 Southern Historical Association meeting in Birmingham, AL the panelists focused on the experiences of northern civilians who traveled south into the Confederacy during the Civil War. The panelists were Paul E. Teed (Saginaw Valley State University) and Frank J. Cirillo (New-York Historical Society) with Caroline E. Janney (University of Virginia) presiding. Comments were provided by Michael T. Bernath (University of Miami) ad Paul A. Cimbala (Fordham University).

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Reporting from the SHA: Defining Defeat—Three Approaches to Making Sense of Loss and the Confederate Experience

Reporting from the SHA: Defining Defeat—Three Approaches to Making Sense of Loss and the Confederate Experience

Historians had long analyzed the context of Confederate defeat during Reconstruction and the creation of the Lost Cause in the years after Reconstruction ended. This panel at the 2018 Southern Historical Association demonstrated that there are more avenues for historians to unpack the meanings of Confederate defeat and the building of the Lost Cause. The panelists were Amy L. Fluker (University of Mississippi), Ann L. Tucker (University of North Georgia), and Sarah K. Bowman (Columbus State University).

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Thoughts on a Year of Adjunct Teaching

Thoughts on a Year of Adjunct Teaching

Historians have held many conversations over the past months about the state of the profession, particularly in academia, as scholars wrestle with an increasingly difficult job market and a prominent role in public debates about the place of history in our modern world. In addition, conversations about the role of adjuncts in academia are happening in the larger university setting, whether over the job market, the transition of colleges using adjuncts rather than full time faculty, or the situation of adjuncts lacking proper pay and benefits.

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Reporting from the SCWH: Plenary Session on Monuments and Memory at Gettysburg NMP

Reporting from the SCWH: Plenary Session on Monuments and Memory at Gettysburg NMP

Using Gettysburg as a focus, these five historians engaged in the complicated question of what to do with Confederate memory and the role historians must play in the conversations happening all over the country. The answer to the question of Confederate monuments and commemoration is not clear. The fact that there have been several plenary sessions at conferences over the past few years, all of which asked a lot of questions and posed a lot of suggestions but could not offer clear solutions, reflects how complex the conversation can be.

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Reporting from the OAH: The Future of Civil War Scholarship Outside US Borders

Reporting from the OAH: The Future of Civil War Scholarship Outside US Borders

Recent scholarship starts to reimagine the boundaries of Civil War scholarship in continental or international terms and reexamines the role of the West in both the antebellum and wartime periods. The opportunities of this new scholarship were evident in two panels presented at the Organization of American Historians conference in April 2018.

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Reporting from the AHA: Success Tips for the Academic Job Market

Reporting from the AHA: Success Tips for the Academic Job Market

Several sessions at this year’s meeting of the American Historical Association focused on the job market, and how to successfully land your first job in academia. Here are tips from historians on how to nail your interview and transition to your first job.

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Heading to Chattanooga! The 2016 Society of Civil War Historians Conference

Heading to Chattanooga! The 2016 Society of Civil War Historians Conference

The Society of Civil War Historians hosts their biennial conference in historic Chattanooga, Tennessee this week, and starting Thursday (June 2), Civil War historians from around the country will converge on Chattanooga to "talk shop," if you will. This includes Civil Discourse's Katie Thompson, Zac Cowsert, and Chuck Welsko, and we hope to bring you all with us as we poke around Chickamauga, take ourselves to the cutting edge of scholarship, present our own research, and generally have a damn good time in Tennessee.

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