The Jewish Review of Books recently reviewed the 2012 book Jews and Booze: Becoming American in the Age of Prohibition (NYU Press), written by PhD alum Marni Davis. Currently Associate Professor of History at Georgia State University, Davis received her PhD in U.S. and Jewish history in 2006. Allan Arkush, the senior contributing editor of the Jewish Review of Books and professor of Judaic studies and history at Binghamton University, reviewed Davis’s book in honor of New Year’s Eve 2021. Read Arkush’s piece here: “Lechaim!“
Month / January 2022
Daniel LaChance Named 2022-23 Chronos Fellow
Congratulations to Dr. Daniel LaChance on receiving the 2022-23 Chronos Faculty Fellowship in the Emory College of Arts and Sciences. LaChance, the Winship Distinguished Research Professor in History, 2020-23, and Associate Professor of History, is the third recipient of the award. A year of paid leave and research stipend will support the completion of LaChance’s next book, Empathy for the Devil: Executions in the American Imagination. Undergraduate students will work alongside LaChance as research assistants on this project. Read more about the fellowship and Empathy for the Devil here: “Emory historian Daniel LaChance named 2022-23 Chronos Fellow.”
Dudziak Quoted in ‘AJC’ Article on GA 2022 Elections
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution recently quoted Dr. Mary L. Dudziak, Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Law and Associated Faculty in the History Department, in an article about Georgia state politics and the 2022 elections. The piece provides an overview of divides among republicans in Georgia, as well as the implications of those cleavages for democratic candidates, in advance of the 2022 elections. Read an excerpt from the article citing Dudziak below along with the full piece: “As 2022 dawns, Georgia Republicans focus on 2020 election.”
“‘The emergency lights are on. The threat to democracy is real and the need to safeguard the electoral system in Georgia is urgent,’ said Mary Dudziak, an Emory University law professor who has written extensively on the intersection of race, civil rights and foreign policy during the Cold War.”
Anderson Describes “Jim Crow 2.0” on ‘Democracy Now’
Dr. Carol Anderson, Charles Howard Candler Professor of African-American Studies and Associated Faculty in the History Department, was a guest on Democracy Now on the one-year anniversary of the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Anderson critiques Republican efforts to limit voting access, especially for Black voters, by promoting baseless claims about voter fraud. Watch Anderson discuss “Jim Crow 2.0” with host Amy Goodman here: “‘White Rage’ Author Carol Anderson: GOP Attack on ‘Election Fraud’ Really an Attack on Black Voters.”
Anderson and Klibanoff Discuss Arbery Case on ‘Closer Look’
Two associated faculty in the History Department – Dr. Carol Anderson (African American Studies) and Hank Klibanoff (Creative Writing) – were recently interviewed on Closer Look with Rose Scott, a program produced by Atlanta’s NPR affiliate WABE. Anderson and Klibanoff discussed the recent convictions and sentencing of the three men who chased and killed Ahmaud Arbery. Anderson is the author, most recently, of The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America (Bloomsbury, 2021). Klibanoff is the host of the WABE podcast Buried Truths, which dedicated its third season to the Arbery’s life and murder. Listen to the full Closer Look interview here.
Anderson Featured on “‘The Nation’s Annual Honor Roll”
Dr. Carol Anderson, Charles Howard Candler Professor and Associated Faculty in the History Department, was recently featured on The Nation’s 2022 Honor Roll. Author John Nichols’s described Anderson as a “Historian Who Explains Now” in the piece, titled “These Progressives Fought the Good Fight in 2021—and Gave Us Hope for 2022.” Read the magazine’s feature of Anderson below and take a look at the full list of honorees here.
“The Emory University professor employs deep historical analyses to identify the roots of current crises, and in 2021 her voice was vital. In her latest book, The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America (Bloomsbury), Anderson revealed how the Second Amendment has been used to arm and empower white supremacists from the founding of the republic to the night Kyle Rittenhouse started shooting in Kenosha, Wis. And in a column for The Guardian on impunity, titled “White Supremacists Declare War on Democracy and Walk Away Unscathed,” Anderson explained why the Capitol insurrectionists felt so confident that they could attack the very underpinnings of our democracy. ‘American democracy’s most dangerous adversary is white supremacy,’ Anderson wrote. ‘Throughout this nation’s history, white supremacy has undermined, twisted and attacked the viability of the United States. What makes white supremacy so lethal, however, is not just its presence but also the refusal to hold its adherents fully accountable for the damage they have done and continue to do to the nation. The insurrection on 6 January and the weak response are only the latest example.‘”
Klibanoff Discusses DOJ’s Decision to Close Emmett Till Case
Hank Klibanoff, James M. Cox Jr. Professor of Journalism and Associated Faculty in the History Department, was recently a guest on “Closer Look,” a program produced by the Atlanta NPR affiliate WABE. Klibanoff discussed the decision by the U.S. Department of Justice to once again close its investigation into the murder of Emmett Till. The cold case was reopened in 2004 and again in 2017. Klibanoff hosts the “Buried Truths” podcast and serves as the director of the Georgia Civil Rights Cold Cases Project at Emory. Listen to Klibanoff’s conversation with host Rose Scott here: “Local professor discusses the Department of Justice’s decision to close Emmett Till case.”
Lowery’s Indigenous History Course Engages Students in Spirited Debate
In her first semester at Emory, Cahoon Family Professor of American History Malinda Maynor Lowery adopted a novel approach to her course “Legal History of Native Peoples.” With the support of Emory’s Barkley Forum for Debate, Deliberation and Dialogue, Lowery embedded student-led debate into the foundation of the course. Through debate and independent research, the students and Lowery studied contemporary laws in the historical context of indigenous communities and their legal systems. Read the Emory News Center’s full profile of the course for more: “Indigenous history course uses debate format to create broad engagement.”
Emory Historians Celebrated in ‘Feast of Words’
Each year the Emory Center for Faculty Development and Excellence, Emory Libraries, and the Emory Barnes and Noble Bookstore host the “Feast of Words,” an event celebrating Emory faculty who have written or edited books in the prior year. This year’s edition, which took place via Zoom, featured multiple works published by History Department faculty, associated faculty, and an alumnus between September 2020 and August 2021. Find a list of those faculty below, along with their publications, and watch the full virtual celebration here.
Anderson, Carol (African American Studies). The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America. Bloomsbury.
Andrade, Antonio (History). The Last Embassy: The Dutch Mission of 1795 and the Forgotten History of Western Encounters with China. Princeton UP.
Dudziak, Mary (Law) and Mark Philip Bradley, eds. Making the Forever War: Marilyn Young on the Culture and Politics of American Militarism. U of Massachusetts P.
Guidotti-Hernandez, Nicole (English). Archiving Mexican Masculinities in Diaspora. Duke UP.
Lal, Ruby (Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies). Empress: The Astonishing Reign of Nur Jahan. Penguin Random House, India.
Pardo, Rafael (Law), Paul Barron, and Mark Wessman. Secured Transactions: Problems and Materials. West Academic.
Perry, Craig (Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies and Jewish Studies), David Eltis (History, emeritus), Stanley Engerman, and David Richardson, eds. The Cambridge World History of Slavery: Volume 2, AD 500 – AD 1420. Cambridge UP.
‘TIME’ Features Research Conducted by Klibanoff and Students for ‘Buried Truths’ Podcast
TIME recently featured historical research conducted by the Emory team behind the “Buried Truths” podcast. Season three of the podcast, which is led by James M. Cox Jr. Professor of Journalism Hank Klibanoff and comprised of Emory undergraduate students, focused on the murder of Ahmaud Arbery. The researchers identified various direct descendants of Arbery, including an enslaved local leader in agriculture and environmental engineering, Bilali Mohammed, through census research. Read an excerpt from the TIME piece below along with the full article: “What Ahmaud Arbery’s Death Has Meant for the Place Where He Lived.”
“In the 1700s, some of Watts and Arbery’s shared ancestors arrived in the region in a group of enslaved families brought to Sapelo Island to cultivate rice, cotton and indigo to enrich their white slaveholders. On his father’s side, Arbery was also the direct descendant of Bilali Mohammed, an enslaved man originally from West Africa brought to the island after first being enslaved in the Caribbean, according to the team of students behind Atlanta Public Radio’s Buried Truths podcast. The students, lead by Hank Klibanoff, director and co-teacher of the Georgia Civil Rights Cold Cases Project at Emory University, were able to confirm that lineage by hunting through Census and other records after a detailed tip shared by Barger, something of a local-history buff. Mohammed—whose slaveholder represented Georgia in the U.S. Congress—was an important source of African agricultural and engineering techniques befitting a climate where rice will grow; that knowledge was key to making Brunswick a prosperous center of economic and cultural activity. Mohammed left behind a 13-page Arabic-language manuscript that is today in the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript collection at the University of Georgia.“