Photographs of war, more than photographs of any other subject, make war seem both very distant and impossibly close.
On Veterans’ Day: War Photos
Great Books on Enslaved Life and Labor in the US
Classic studies, the newest works, and a few novels on labor and gender and the institutions of slavery in the United States.
The Last Colonial Massacre: Latin America in the Cold War by Greg Grandin (2004)
The Last Colonial Massacre: Latin America in the Cold War combines incisive analysis of Cold War repression in Guatemala with a history of the country's century-long mobilization leading up to the 1978 Panzós massacre that resulted in the deaths of Q’eqchi’ Maya men, women, and children. The Panzós massacre launched an intense and brutal escalation of violence, the effects of which continue to reverberate in contemporary Guatemalan society.
Scum of the Earth by Arthur Koestler (1941)
Arthur Koestler lived a remarkable life – as dramatic a death-defying tour of twentieth century Europe as you can find. He was born in Budapest (in 1905) and went to school in Vienna.
George on the Lege, Part 8 – Public Higher Education
With budget cuts of between $1.2 and $2 billion (9-15%) looming for the 2012-2013 fiscal biennium, Texas public institutions of higher education confront the same task as public primary and secondary schools: educating more students with less state aid.
Sounds of the Past
Interested in popular music and the music industry in the early twentieth century? The Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project at the University of California at Santa Barbara has built perhaps the most useful archive on the planet for you.
Toyin Falola on Africa and the United States
Often wrongly considered to be on the periphery of the history of the United States, Africa has played an important role politically, economically, and culturally from before American independence until the present day.
The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan by Yasmin Khan (2008)
Reading this compelling account of the partition of India in 1947, one is moved to ask: What were they thinking? Early accounts of the end of British rule in India concentrate on the high politics of the negotiations between the leaders of the Indian National Congress, the Muslim League, and a succession of Viceroys—ending with the striking and decisive Lord Mountbatten.
H. W. Brands on the Rise of American Capitalism
During the quarter millennium since American independence, two institutions and sets of values have come to characterize American society: democracy and capitalism.
Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood by Alexandra Fuller (2003)
Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight is Alexandra Fuller’s coming of age memoir set in the midst of a war-torn African nation. She recounts, in often vivid detail, the harsh realities of living in a violently polarized society and the deep scars that war leaves upon its survivors.