The past is never dead. It's not even past
by Tiana Wilson As we rapidly approach the 2020 US presidential election, Kamala Harris’ acceptance of the Democratic party’s nomination for Vice President offers great hope to a variety of marginalized communities who have been historically underrepresented in the national political arena. Harris, who identifies as a Black woman, is the daughter of Indian and […]
History professors often look for ways to use the past to inform present debates. With long-past events, that sometimes requires some acrobatic leaps over centuries or millennia, but in my own courses on violence in American history, the connections are often pretty obvious. Every day, a stream of new or ongoing violent events invite historical […]
From the Editors: This article is accompanied by a comment from Jeremi Suri, the Mack Brown Distinguished Chair for Leadership in Global Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin. Such comments are a new feature for Not Even Past designed to provide different ways to engage with important new work. This week marks the […]
Over the past decade, Not Even Past has published a wide range of resources that focus on the history of slavery. These are intended for use in the classroom and are collected here as a resource for teachers. Articles White Women and the Economy of Slavery White slave-owning women were not the only ones to […]
From the editor: I joined the University of Texas at Austin in 2019. One of the reasons I wanted to become the editor of Not Even Past was so that I would get an opportunity to learn more about my colleagues’ research but also their teaching. We have numerous prize-winning teachers in the department but […]
With Joan Neuberger This is a conversation with Dr. Joan Neuberger, the Founding Editor of Not Even Past. Not Even Past was born in 2010 and launched in January 2011. In 2020, it marks its ten-year anniversary. Since its creation, the site has emerged as a robust and influential platform for Public History. This owes a great deal to the […]
By James Sidbury, Rice University Note: This is adapted from a talk given at the Houston Museum of African American Culture. The last several years have brought surprisingly quick if long-overdue changes to the politics surrounding memorials to the Confederacy and the soldiers who fought for it. Most recently Virginia, for so long the proud […]
by Rodrigo Salido Moulinié Can art really say anything? Although it may seem like a childish question, raising it triggers some unsettling thoughts. Much of what we usually think about artists and their work, the role art plays in our worlds, and even the possibility of writing its history relies on the answer to that […]
In 2001, many of Lizzie Scott Neblett’s diaries and letters were published in a volume entitled A Rebel Wife In Texas. The text provides a harrowing glimpse into the desperation, brutality, and minutiae of everyday life in antebellum Texas from the perspective of a landed, slaveholding, Southern wife. Letters written to Neblett prior to her […]
On the eve of the Civil War, an advertisement appeared in the Texas Almanac announcing the sale of five enslaved people at the Stringer’s Hotel. “Negroes For Sale––I will offer for sale, in the city of Austin, before the Stringer’s Hotel, on the 1st day of January next, to the highest bidder, in Confederate or […]