Category Archives: teaching writing history

History over the Air

Posted on July 13, 2010 by Adam Arenson

How much history do you listen to? What are the best history radio shows and podcasts, after this one? What makes them great? Continue reading →

Posted in digital humanities, podcast, research, syllabus, teaching writing history | 6 Comments

Spinning Yarns about this Spinning Planet

Posted on July 2, 2010 by Jana Remy

Narrative threads: reading, writing, talking after the conference is over Continue reading →

Posted in books, events, readings, teaching writing history | 1 Comment

Martha Sandweiss’s Passing Strange: Excellent History at the Edge of Knowability

Posted on April 28, 2010 by Adam Arenson

The first thing to know about Martha Sandweiss’s Passing Strange is that it is gripping. When I first cracked it open, in a Seattle hotel room last March, I found myself one hundred pages in before checking the time. This … Continue reading →

Posted in books, deep thoughts, inspiration points, research, teaching writing history, writing | 1 Comment

"Letters to a Tenured Historian" now available

Posted on March 2, 2010 by Adam Arenson

My Writing of History class is now reading exemplary histories. In historiography-driven courses, so often the new trumps all. But when a course focuses on history writing, there is a fruitful dialogue between new books and old, often with a different … Continue reading →

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Stephen Pyne’s How-To of History: Thinking, Choosing, Writing

Posted on February 19, 2010 by Adam Arenson

(Apologies to those of you who dutifully waited up Wednesday for this post; it’s that time of semester. But my book manuscript did get finalized as you waited, so it’s a step closer to store shelves!) I was quite impressed … Continue reading →

Posted in announcements, books, inspiration points, resources, teaching writing history | 2 Comments

Allan Megill and rigorous history in an age of fragmentation

Posted on February 11, 2010 by Adam Arenson

Allan Megill’s Historical Knowledge, Historical Error should be required reading for historians. This collection of essays grapples with many of the profession’s current obsessions – memory, identity, narrative, objectivity, grand narrative, cultural history, counterfactuals, epistemology – in an open-hearted yet … Continue reading →

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After the Linguistic Turn, a Productive History of Silences?

Posted on February 4, 2010 by Adam Arenson

Shall we seek the history of silences? Continue reading →

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Virginia Scharff, Fawn Brodie, and the lobster

Posted on January 28, 2010 by Adam Arenson

Shouldn’t the proponents of writing history have more to say to one another? Continue reading →

Posted in teaching writing history | 8 Comments

What Do We Teach When We Teach “The Writing of History”?

Posted on January 21, 2010 by Adam Arenson

Tomorrow night my graduate course on the writing of history has its first meeting. With the students pre-registered and the syllabus pre-circulated, we plan to jump right in, reading many of the influential essays and articles on the choices made … Continue reading →

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Imagining the Future of History — Are you Isms or Ism-free?

Posted on January 12, 2010 by Adam Arenson

AHA session recap: Imagining the Future of History — Are you Isms or Ism-free? This semester I am offering a graduate course on “The Writing of History” (syllabus here). I’ll talk more about my choices and its progress over the … Continue reading →

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