Category: Current Events

Swimming Pool Historian Responds to Philadelphia Incident

In the past month, an occurrence in the suburbs of Philadelphia has turned into a national story. After a group of minority children were disinvited by a private swimming pool’s administration, community members were outraged. Senator Arlen Spector said that if allegations were true, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was likely violated. Now, the United States Justice Department plans… Continue Reading Swimming Pool Historian Responds to Philadelphia Incident

African American Studies/American History/Civil Rights/Current Events/History/UNC Press Authors

Road Trip, Anyone? Check out Music Festivals in Western NC!

Looking for something new, fun and relatively inexpensive to do this summer? Several counties and towns in western North Carolina offer a variety of festivals, celebrations, and cultural events that feature bluegrass music, dance, and traditional food of Southern Appalachia. The festivals in western NC are a sample of what is offered all along the Blue Ridge Music Trail, a… Continue Reading Road Trip, Anyone? Check out Music Festivals in Western NC!

Appalachian Studies/Cooking / Food/Current Events/Events/Music/Native Amer./Indigenous Studies/North Carolina/Travel

John Hope Franklin memorial service

Family, friends, and colleagues shared memories and inspiration in a loving service in honor of John Hope Franklin and his wife Aurelia Whittington Franklin yesterday at Duke Chapel. We say goodbye to a wise and generous man, a history-making historian, and an old friend.

African American History/African American Studies/American History/Current Events/History/North Carolina/UNC Press Authors

Eric Muller discusses Supreme Court ruling on profiling and detentions immediately following 9/11

From the Washington Post: The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that former attorney general John D. Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III may not be sued by a Pakistani man who was seized in the United States after the 2001 terrorist attacks and who alleged harsh treatment because of his religion and ethnicity. The court ruled 5 to 4… Continue Reading Eric Muller discusses Supreme Court ruling on profiling and detentions immediately following 9/11

American History/Asian Studies/Civil Rights/Current Events/Law / Legal History/Religion/UNC Press Authors

Obama’s foreign policy in light of ‘The American Ascendancy’

Today we welcome a guest post from Michael H. Hunt, author of The American Ascendancy: How the United States Gained and Wielded Global Dominance, a new paperback edition of which has just been published. In the book, Hunt gives a long historical view of what factors enabled the United States to evolve from colonial outpost to global preeminence and explores… Continue Reading Obama’s foreign policy in light of ‘The American Ascendancy’

American History/Current Events/Guest Bloggers/History/Michael H. Hunt/Politics/UNC Press Authors

Authors speak: interviews, op-eds, and more

We’ve got several authors out there making appearances online in various forms. If you’ve missed some of the live appearances in this busy spring, take a moment to follow-up virtually. In history… Russell McClintock, author of Lincoln and the Decision for War, was interviewed recently by Michael Noirot over at This Mighty Scourge. An excerpt from Amy Wood‘s new book,… Continue Reading Authors speak: interviews, op-eds, and more

African American Studies/American History/Civil War/Cuba/Current Events/History/Interviews/Islamic Studies/Latin American/Caribbean Hist./Middle Eastern Studies/Native Amer./Indigenous Studies/Politics/Religion/UNC Press Authors

Those Who Don’t Learn From History Are Doomed to Repeat it….

April 14, 2009 proved to be a dark day for progress and equality in, ironically, one of the most liberal collegiate atmospheres in the country. Forty-six years after the highly controversial Speaker Ban law was passed, it seems that the UNC Chapel Hill finds itself once again in the spotlight. In 1963, the Speaker Ban prohibited members of the Communist… Continue Reading Those Who Don’t Learn From History Are Doomed to Repeat it….

American History/Current Events/Law / Legal History/UNC Press News

Job Programs and Stimulus II: What We Can Learn from New Deal Programs

I’m pleased to have a guest post today from Frank Stricker, author of Why America Lost the War on Poverty — And How to Win It, which we published in 2007. That book focused on the second half of the twentieth century. In his current work, Stricker’s looking more closely at unemployment and job creation, and looking further back in… Continue Reading Job Programs and Stimulus II: What We Can Learn from New Deal Programs

American History/Current Events/Economics/Guest Bloggers/Politics/Public Policy/The Book Biz

Robert McElvaine on The News Hour: reconsidering consumption

I’ve posted a couple of items recently (here and here) about the renewed relevance in these painful economic times of Robert McElvaine’s classic collection of letters written to FDR, Down and Out in the Great Depression: Letters from the Forgotten Man. On Friday, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer aired a wonderful segment featuring McElvaine and his book, incorporating some… Continue Reading Robert McElvaine on The News Hour: reconsidering consumption

American History/American Studies/Current Events/Economics/Interviews/Podcasts/UNC Press Authors/UNC Press News

Remembrances for Franklin abound

Our hearts are warmed by the outpouring of remembrances for John Hope Franklin. We’ve been blogging about it the past couple of days (here and here), but there’s no letting up yet. In a New York Times editorial, Brent Staples cites John Hope’s “groundbreaking work on free Negroes in antebellum North Carolina” (that would be JHF’s first book, The Free… Continue Reading Remembrances for Franklin abound

African American History/African American Studies/American History/Biography / Autobiography/Current Events/History/UNC Press Authors/UNC Press News

In memoriam, John Hope Franklin (1915-2009)

The ties between the nation’s most distinguished historian and UNC Press go back a very long way. In 1943, UNC Press (which had already made something of a name for itself by its books by and about African Americans) published John Hope Franklin’s first book, The Free Negro in North Carolina, 1790-1860. It was a revision of his Harvard dissertation… Continue Reading In memoriam, John Hope Franklin (1915-2009)

African American History/African American Studies/American History/Current Events/History/North Carolina/UNC Press Authors/UNC Press News

Places to go, people to see

The sun is just starting to break through the morning cloud cover on this warm spring day. Last day of sunshine before we roll into a week of rain here in the Triangle, say the weather forecasters, so let’s make the most of it! In the next few days, there will be several opportunities to hear various UNC Press authors… Continue Reading Places to go, people to see

African American Studies/American History/Biography / Autobiography/Civil War/Cooking / Food/Current Events/Events/Gay / Lesbian Studies/Gender Studies/Health / Medicine/History/Interviews/Local Indy Booksellers/Military History/Military Studies/North Carolina/Podcasts/Southern Studies/The Book Biz/UNC Press Authors/UNC Press News

Women and Obama’s First 100 Days

What does the Obama presidency mean for women, especially in a time of financial crisis? We’re pleased to have a guest post today from Lisa Levenstein, assistant professor of history at UNC-Greensboro and author of A Movement Without Marches: African American Women and the Politics of Poverty in Postwar Philadelphia, which we will publish May 1 (we’re accepting orders now).… Continue Reading Women and Obama’s First 100 Days

African American Studies/American History/Current Events/Economics/Gender Studies/Guest Bloggers/Politics/Public Policy/Women's Studies

February 25, 2009

Harwood follows up on ethical issues at stake in the octuplets case

We’ve had a lot of passionate responses to Karey Harwood’s recent guest post about the ethical issues surrounding the California octuplets case. Harwood gave some helpful responses for further reading in the comments thread to that post. Here, we’re pleased to have a follow-up post from her, in which she addresses the pressures on patients and providers in the… Continue Reading Harwood follows up on ethical issues at stake in the octuplets case

Current Events/Ethics/Guest Bloggers/Health / Medicine/UNC Press News

February 6, 2009

Ethics and the California octuplets case

When news about a woman who had given birth to octuplets last week first hit the airwaves, the story was that all had survived the premature Caesarean delivery, and the eighth kid was one doctors hadn’t even known was coming! Surprise! Within days, however, as we learned more about the birth family – that the mother was single and already… Continue Reading Ethics and the California octuplets case

Current Events/Ethics/Guest Bloggers/Health / Medicine

February 2, 2009

Fatemeh Keshavarz to appear on Just Peace radio show this evening

As Iran celebrates the 30th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution, a network of individuals and associations inside and outside of Iran known as Iranians for Peace have written to President Obama to encourage direct dialogue with Iranian authorities to find political solutions to nuclear standoffs. They also call for “a nuclear-weapon-free zone for ALL the countries in the Middle East,… Continue Reading Fatemeh Keshavarz to appear on Just Peace radio show this evening

Biography / Autobiography/Current Events/Islamic Studies/Middle Eastern Studies/UNC Press Authors/UNC Press News

December 17, 2008

Shoe Throwing: it means what you think it means

By now we’ve all seen the clips of the Iraqi journalist throwing his shoes at President Bush during a presser over the weekend. And in the aftermath, of course, the media started asking if we should apply some deeper symbolic meaning to the act, as if it were committed with some non-Western kind of anger, a super-duper Arab kind of… Continue Reading Shoe Throwing: it means what you think it means

Current Events/Middle Eastern Studies

December 11, 2008

There Is Power in a Union

YouTube: Billy Bragg – There Is Power in a Union Laid off with a mere 3 days’ notice (instead of the legally required 60 days) and denied severance, health insurance, and earned vacation pay, about 200 employees of Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago have been peacefully occupying the Republic factory for five days. Last night their union agreed to… Continue Reading There Is Power in a Union

American History/Current Events/Gender Studies/History/Labor Studies

December 2, 2008

Major college football: more competitive and cut-throat than the NFL?

Michael Oriard, author of three books on football published by UNC Press (Reading Football: How the Popular Press Created an American Spectacle [1998], King Football: Sport and Spectacle in the Golden Age of Radio and Newsreels, Movies and Magazines, the Weekly and the Daily Press [2001], and Brand NFL: Making and Selling America’s Favorite Sport [2006]), has a fourth book… Continue Reading Major college football: more competitive and cut-throat than the NFL?

American History/American Studies/Current Events/Economics/Sports

November 13, 2008

Reflections on the 2008 Election

The following post is from Christopher A. Cooper and H. Gibbs Knotts, co-editors of The New Politics of North Carolina. Cooper is MPA director and assistant professor of political science and public affairs at Western Carolina University. Knotts is department head and associate professor of political science and public affairs at Western Carolina University. Every four years journalists, political commentators,… Continue Reading Reflections on the 2008 Election

American History/Current Events/Guest Bloggers/North Carolina/Politics/Southern Studies