September 22, 2014

Interview: Steph Jeffries and Tom Wentworth on Hiking Appalachian Forests

I think most of us are “destination-oriented”—focused on the trail’s end, the scenic vista, the waterfall. Many of our hikes have points of interest such as these, because we love them too. By using our book, you can become a “journey” person as well, someone who sees something new and exciting around each bend in the trail. We want you to start seeing the forest intimately, instead of a background of green noise. Continue Reading Interview: Steph Jeffries and Tom Wentworth on Hiking Appalachian Forests

Categories Environmental Studies/Hiking/Nature/Travel
September 18, 2014

Excerpt: Ain’t Got No Home, by Erin Royston Battat

Yet a closer inspection of the Scottsboro case reveals how complicated was the relationship between African Americans and the Communist Party in the 1930s. The CP championed the working-class and unemployed masses, but these were precisely the people who had terrorized the black boys on the train, falsely accused them of rape, and would have lynched them without the governor’s intervention. Antilynching activists, on one hand, and labor defenders, on the other, relied on diametrically opposed conceptions of the populist masses and the law. Whereas the antilynching movement called for the rule of law to quell mob hysteria, labor defense stood up for workers against a prejudicial legal system. These opposing views posed a challenge to the CP in attracting black members and sympathizers. While communists prophesied a future revolution led by an international proletariat, the most visible form of proletarian collective action in the South, according to some skeptical observers at the time, was the lynch mob. Continue Reading Excerpt: Ain’t Got No Home, by Erin Royston Battat

Categories African American History/African American Studies/Excerpts/History
September 15, 2014

Chantal Norrgard: Wisconsin Mining Legislation and the Fallacy of Jobs vs. Treaty Rights

Since the legislation was first introduced in 2011, local community members, environmental activists, and Ojibwe Bands from throughout the region have fiercely opposed it. The Bad River Band asserts that the legislation violates their rights to hunt, fish, and gather in ceded territory reserved in treaties with the United States in 1837 and 1842 and that the state has failed to consult with them on the bill. They are currently seeking federal redress. However, Governor Walker and Wisconsin Republican legislators have disregarded this opposition and have received $15 million from mining executives and supporters. Continue Reading Chantal Norrgard: Wisconsin Mining Legislation and the Fallacy of Jobs vs. Treaty Rights

Categories Author blog entry/Guest Bloggers/Labor Studies/Native Amer./Indigenous Studies
September 11, 2014

Excerpt: Pageants, Parlors, and Pretty Women, by Blain Roberts

On the whole, black southern women forged a more intimate—and more active—relationship with the burgeoning world of beauty than did white southern women. Continue Reading Excerpt: Pageants, Parlors, and Pretty Women, by Blain Roberts

Categories African American History/African American Studies/American Studies/Gender Studies/Women's Studies
September 9, 2014

Interview: Sahar Amer on ‘What Is Veiling?’

The greatest misunderstanding about veiling is that it is imposed by an outside party, not willingly adopted by women. To be sure, some women are forced to veil because of parental pressures or because of the government of the country in which they live. But they are the minority, not the majority, as much of the media wants us to believe. Continue Reading Interview: Sahar Amer on ‘What Is Veiling?’

Categories Interviews/Islamic Studies/Religion/Women's Studies
September 8, 2014

Come Celebrate NCpedia September 13

North Carolina’s history and more unusual stories will be celebrated at “Stranger Than Fiction: True Stories Found in NCpedia,” a free event at the North Carolina Museum of History, 5 E. Edenton St., Raleigh, on Saturday, Sept. 13, 2014, from 12 p.m. to 4 p.m. Continue Reading Come Celebrate NCpedia September 13

Categories Events/History/North Carolina/Reference
September 3, 2014

Excerpt: Island Queens and Mission Wives, by Jennifer Thigpen

Thigpen describes the voyage of New England missionaries to Hawai’i and the political shifts occurring on the island that signaled the powerful role women would play in the cultural interactions that lay ahead. Continue Reading Excerpt: Island Queens and Mission Wives, by Jennifer Thigpen

Categories Anthropology/Excerpts/Gender Studies/Native Amer./Indigenous Studies/Women's Studies
September 2, 2014

Claude Andrew Clegg III: Elijah Muhammad, Then and Now

Our America is a product of Muhammad’s America and to know our times is to appreciate the era in which he lived. Continue Reading Claude Andrew Clegg III: Elijah Muhammad, Then and Now

Categories African American History/African American Studies/American History/Author blog entry/Biography / Autobiography/Guest Bloggers/History/Islamic Studies/Religion
August 28, 2014

Gregory F. Domber: What Putin Misunderstands about American Power

Putin is pushing a new nationalist conservatism with a strong strain of anti-Americanism, promoting a vision of the United States as the primary conspirator pulling strings to foster international chaos and regime change.

As former Ambassador to Russia Mike McFaul noted recently in the New Yorker, “Putin has a theory of American power that has some empirical basis.” The CIA overthrew governments in Iran and Guatemala, the United States bombed Belgrade to remove a dictator, and there is, of course, Iraq. However, a close examination of American policy toward Poland—the country the United States pushed hardest to break from the Soviet sphere in the 1980s—brings to the fore just how far the Russian president’s views are removed from reality. The United States is not nearly the revolutionary mastermind Putin seems to think it is. Continue Reading Gregory F. Domber: What Putin Misunderstands about American Power

Categories Author blog entry/Current Events/European History/Guest Bloggers/History/Political Science
August 21, 2014

Stephen Cushman on one of the quieter anniversaries of the Civil War

Over at our Civil War blog, Stephen Cushman, author of Belligerent Muse: Five Northern Writers and How They Shaped Our Understanding of the Civil War highlights a Civil War anniversary likely to be overlooked in this year’s sesquicentennial observances. Continue Reading Stephen Cushman on one of the quieter anniversaries of the Civil War

Categories American History/Civil War/History
August 20, 2014

Chantal Norrgard: The Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission: Tribal Sovereignty in Action

Sovereignty is a contested term in Native American and Indigenous Studies, but as political scientist David Wilkins has asserted, tribal sovereignty is not the same as Western concepts of sovereignty. It exists as a “spiritual, moral, and cultural force” that propels a tribal community towards political economic and cultural integrity and “mature relationships” with itself, with other groups, and with the environment. The Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC) exemplifies this definition and shows how tribal sovereignty applies to the complex process of decolonization among Lake Superior Ojibwe. Continue Reading Chantal Norrgard: The Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission: Tribal Sovereignty in Action

Categories Author blog entry/Guest Bloggers/History/Native Amer./Indigenous Studies
August 11, 2014

Luther Adams: Claiming the South as Home: African Americans and Southern Identity

Claiming the South as Home was and still is a call to action and for reparations, but it is also an expression of black southern identity. Continue Reading Luther Adams: Claiming the South as Home: African Americans and Southern Identity

Categories African American History/African American Studies/Author blog entry/Guest Bloggers/History/Southern Studies
August 7, 2014

Excerpt: Talkin’ Tar Heel, by Walt Wolfram and Jeffrey Reaser

A worker in the Bank of America Corporate Center in Charlotte who asks you to “mash the button” for the elevator or to “he’p him tote the computer right yonder” would get a quizzical look or a patronizing chuckle for “talking country” in the towering edifice representing the second-largest financial center in the United States. But those who react in condescension may not realize that this way of speaking was the dialect norm in the city just a couple of generations ago—and probably in the residential home that once stood on this site. As one elderly Charlotte resident, born in 1919, recalled: “I remember when Discovery Place was just a little neighborhood store.” Continue Reading Excerpt: Talkin’ Tar Heel, by Walt Wolfram and Jeffrey Reaser

Categories Appalachian Studies/Excerpts/North Carolina/Southern Studies
August 4, 2014

Sarah S. Elkind: Air Pollution and Prosperity

I was recently interviewed for a series of radio essays called “We Used to Be China,” on China’s air pollution, by Sarah Gardner at American Public Radio’s Marketplace. These stories got me thinking about China’s air pollution problem, and about Marketplace’s premise. Did we, the United States, used to be China? In what ways? Continue Reading Sarah S. Elkind: Air Pollution and Prosperity

Categories American History/Author blog entry/Environmental Studies/Guest Bloggers
July 30, 2014

Excerpt: The Indicted South, by Angie Maxwell

Many white southerners were particularly concerned with the way history would present their side of the sectional conflict and how it would judge their advocates, such as Bryan. Thus controlling, in some way, what children were taught in schools actually carried a significant sub-agenda. Continue Reading Excerpt: The Indicted South, by Angie Maxwell

Categories American History/Excerpts/Southern Studies
July 28, 2014

UNC Press Scholarly Monographs Now Live on Oxford’s UPSO Platform

The University of North Carolina Press is pleased to announce the launch of North Carolina Scholarship Online on Oxford University Press’s University Press Scholarship Online (UPSO) platform to take advantage of a fully enabled XML environment with cutting-edge search and discovery functionality. Continue Reading UNC Press Scholarly Monographs Now Live on Oxford’s UPSO Platform

Categories UNC Press News
July 23, 2014

Excerpt: New Netherland Connections, by Susanah Shaw Romney

Men sailing out from Amsterdam often trusted and relied on their wives above all others. Like all Dutch huysvrouwen, or housewives, maritime women formed essential partnerships with their husbands, and they had detailed knowledge of their seafaring spouses’ interests and personal property. Continue Reading Excerpt: New Netherland Connections, by Susanah Shaw Romney

Categories American History/Excerpts/Women's Studies