It’s hard to be a historian these days without constantly hearing about the supposed irrelevance of your work. After all, it […]
Female Presidential Candidates Aren’t the Answer: Republicans and the Reframing of the War on Women in 2016
There seems to be some confusion about what the controversial term “the Republican war on women” actually means. Most became […]
Police Brutality, Mental Illness, and Race in the Age of Mass Incarceration
On November 9, 2014, two Ann Arbor police officers shot and killed Aura Rosser, a 40-year-old black woman, after responding […]
Obergefell Made History, and History Made Obergefell
History matters. Sober and sophisticated historical research can make a difference in the world. I am proud to live in […]
Obergefell v. Hodges, Marriage Equality, and the Making of Global Queer History
One morning in late June, the U.S. Supreme Court will issue its history-making decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, the collection […]
Love, Sex, and Pink Viagra
Ever heard of Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder (HSDD)? It’s a new “disease” distressing tens of thousands of (presumably straight) women. […]
You’re Wearing That?
In February of this year, Urban Outfitters began selling a tapestry covered with faded gray stripes and adorned with pink […]
Nursing Clio is under Construction: UPDATE!
Hello Nursing Clio readers. Big things are happening! Our official relaunch date is set for Friday, May 29th and we […]
Moralizing Motherhood: America’s Long History of the Breastfeeding Police
By Ginny Engholm
A recent Facebook post by our own Jacqueline Antonovich weighed in on one of the most contentious issues in the mommy wars — breastfeeding. She was responding to another Facebook post by a well-known feminist blogger who goes by the name The Feminist Breeder. Antonovich wrote, “I finally had to unfollow a page about feminism and birth/parenting. I’m all for breastfeeding, but if you are going to say you are not trying to judge, but you just ‘don’t get’ women who bottle feed, then you are too wrapped up in your liberal, upper-class, white world to understand how economics, culture, body type, cancer, and/or sexual trauma can make breastfeeding difficult or impossible. So tired of sanctimonious mommies.”
Come to the Dark Side: Disability as “Dark” Civil War History
By Sarah Handley-Cousins
While the rest of the world was happily decking the halls and calling for goodwill toward men, Civil War historians — in the now-famous words of Historista blogger and historian Megan Kate Nelson — were “freaking out.”
They weren’t freaking out because of the discovery of some great new source material, or an exciting new publication. They were freaking out because both Civil War History and The Journal of the Civil War Era, the two major journals in the field, each published an article in their December issues that criticized the state of current Civil War research and writing. The major concern for the articles’ authors — Gary Gallagher and Kathryn Shively Meier for JCWE and Earl J. Hess for CWH — was that Civil War military historians, already a dying breed, are being hurried to their demise by eager social and cultural historians who dismiss military history as unscholarly and old-fashioned. Earl Hess suggests that “understanding the real battlefield of 1861-1865 is essential to understanding everything else about the Civil War.”[1] Gallagher and Meier assert that “because the Civil War was a massive war, every scholar of the conflict should be at least basically versed in its military history.”[2]
