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Leaders of the 1963 March on Washington posing in front of the statue of Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln Memorial. August 28, 1963.

How the 1619 Project Distorted History

The 1619 Project claimed to reveal the unknown history of slavery. It ended up helping to distort the real history of slavery and the struggle against it.
The community organizer Sylvester Hoover and Nikole Hannah-Jones, Greenwood, Mississippi; from episode 6 of The 1619 Project.

History Bright and Dark

Americans have often been politically divided. But have the divisions over how we recount our history ever been so deep?
Ocean waves and cloudy skies.

The 1619 Project Unrepentantly Pushes Junk History

Nikole Hannah-Jones' new book sidesteps scholarly critics while quietly deleting previous factual errors.
Side profile of Nikole Hannah-Jones

What the 1619 Project Means

Nothing could be more toxic to our ongoing effort to build a multiracial democracy than to cast any race as a perennial hero or villain.
Statue of Stonewall Jackson, on its side in slings and propped up by tires, in front of its graffiti-covered pedestal.

What the 1619 Project Got Wrong

It erases the fact that, for the first 70 years of its existence, the US was roiled by intense, escalating conflict over slavery – a conflict only resolved by civil war.
In the preface to a new book version of the 1619 Project, Nikole Hannah-Jones, a reporter and the leading force behind the endeavor, recalls that it began as a “simple pitch.”

The 1619 Project and the Demands of Public History

The ambitious Times endeavor reveals the difficulties that greet a journalistic project when it aspires to shift a founding narrative of the past.
1619 Project cover

The NYT’s Jake Silverstein Concocts “a New Origin Story” for the 1619 Project

The project's editor falsifies the history of American history-writing, openly embracing the privileging of “narrative” over “actual fact.”
Photo illustration of two hands pulling New York Times Magazine article

The Historians Are Fighting

Inside the profession, the battle over the 1619 Project continues.

History As End

1619, 1776, and the politics of the past.

How the 1619 Project Took Over 2020

It’s a hashtag, a talking point, a Trump rally riff. The inside story of a New York Times project that launched a year-long culture war.

1619 and All That

The Editor of the American Historical Review weighs in on recent historiographical debates around the New York Times' 1619 Project.

The Hidden Stakes of the 1619 Controversy

Critics of the New York Times’s 1619 Project obscure a longstanding debate among historians over whether the American Revolution was a proslavery revolt.

A Matter of Facts

The New York Times’ 1619 Project launched with the best of intentions, but has been undermined by some of its claims.

The Fight Over the 1619 Project Is Not About the Facts

A dispute between some scholars and the authors of NYT Magazine’s issue on slavery represents a fundamental disagreement over the trajectory of U.S. society.

Preaching a Conspiracy Theory

The 1619 Project offers bitterness, fragility, and intellectual corruption—not history.
Cotton field.

How The 1619 Project Rehabilitates the ‘King Cotton’ Thesis

The New York Times’ series on slavery relies on bad scholarship to make an argument with an inauspicious history.
The date "1619" bolded against a gray background.

Engaging The 1619 Project

A collection of resources challenging the notion that the U.S. was built on nothing but injustice and subjugation.
Absalom Jones.

1619 Rightly Understood

David Hackett Fischer's book "African Founders" should be the starting point for any reflection on the enduring African ­influence on American national ideals.
A painting of the American Founders at the Constitutional Convention.

Inventing American Constitutionalism

On "Power and Liberty," a condensed version of Gordon Wood's entire sweep of scholarship about constitutionalism.
White pillars broken in pieces, forming an X.

The Right Side of History

How should historians respond to the urgency of this current political moment?
Black and white photo of the “Star-Spangled Banner” flown during the War of 1812, 1914.

A Fiery Gospel

A conversation about changing the American story.
AHA logo

Is History History? Identity Politics and Teleologies of the Present

When historians concede to discuss the past with the terms of the present, they abandon the skill set that makes them historians.
Poster for HBO documentary "Exterminate All the Brutes," featuring a human skull painted to look like a globe.

We Must Burn Them: Against the Origin Story

"History​ is written by the victors, but diligent and continual silencing is required to maintain its claims on the present and future."

Racecraft and the 1619 Project

Historian Barbara J. Fields explains why you can't understand what happened in 1619 without understanding what happened in 1607.
Illustration of Spanish slaves unloading ice.

Cuba & the US: Necessary Mirrors

Exponentially more enslaved Africans were forced to the lands that now make up Latin America rather than the United States. Where is their story?
Left: stacks of The 1619 Project books; right: Daryl Michael Scott.

Grievance History

Historian Daryl Scott weighs in on the 1619 Project and the "possibility that we rend ourselves on the question of race."
Henry Louis Gates Jr.

How Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Helped Remake the Literary Canon

The scholar has changed the way Black authors get read and the way Black history gets told.
Cracked wall.

The Danger of a Single Origin Story

The 1619 Project and contested foundings.
James H. Sweet

From Inclusive Public Schools to Divisive Concepts

Some personal reflections from American Historical Association president James H. Sweet on the recent wave of "divisive concepts" laws.
Anti-evolution books for sale in Dayton, Tenn.

Why the Culture Wars in Schools Are Worse Than Ever Before

The history of education battles — from fights over evolution to critical race theory — shows why the country’s divisions are growing sharper.

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