Memory

With so little documentary evidence about his life, he is a virtual blank slate upon which different people at different times have inscribed a variety of meanings.

When a college is named for two slave owners, one of whom was a Confederate hero, history is complicated.

A collection of photographs that show nature retaking the battle-ravaged land along the Great War's Western Front.

It’s an exhaustive list. Far longer and deeper than you might suspect.

Virginia Dare and the myth of American whiteness.

The burning of Washington presented an opportunity for Jefferson’s books to educate the nation by becoming a national library.

The effort to dig up information about the immigrant ancestors of prominent Trumpsters is doing more harm than good.

Librarians are once again raising concerns over the book’s depiction of Native Americans.

History is coming to life, and scholars are debating the merits of this wave of re-creation and manipulation.

A documentary attempts to remember forgotten lynching victims.

A reflection on Zora Neale Hurston’s newly-published book, "Barracoon."

Have historians privileged land-based models and ignored how African Americans participated in aquatic activities?

His condemnation of enslaved people’s failure to rebel is drawn from a dangerous ideology that’s older than the United States.

From activist and academic roots, a field takes shape.

In 1931, Zora Neale Hurston recorded the story of Cudjo Lewis, the last living slave-ship survivor. It languished in a vault... until now.

Scholars are mapping the international precursors of Nazism.

Understanding the complex history of the Confederate flag.

Fifty years later, the legacies of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy still loom large.

Our 26th President is lauded as an environmentalist, as well as an empire builder.

Some say the decision to move the statue of Dr. J. Marion Sims from Central Park to a Brooklyn cemetery is a "slap in the face."

History suggests otherwise.

An appreciation of Alfred Crosby, who coined the term "Columbian exchange."

Hannah Duston was used as a national symbol of innocence, valor, and patriotism to justify westward expansion.

Fifty years after his death, King is a national treasure in the US. But what happened to his revolutionary legacy?

In memory of Martin Luther King Jr, a look back on his funeral.

A new exhibition makes a powerful statement about the oversights of American history and America’s art history.

On the 50th anniversary of his death, it’s time to remember who he really was.

It's not enough to say that they pick up critical thinking skills. It's time to offer evidence.

As museums formulate their approach to re-contextualization, they must also recognize their own histories of complicity.

Warnings against "normalizing" outrageous political acts misstate the problem. It’s never the immediate present that gets normalized — it’s the not-so-distant past.