Shadows in History: Religious and Intellectual History in Higher Education
The final post in the ‘Teaching America’ series is by Professor Raymond J. Haberski Jr. (Indiana University School of Liberal Arts) , author of God and War: American Civil Religion Since 1945, (Rutgers University Press, 2012) , who discusses his approach to teaching intellectual and religious history in higher education.
Continue ReadingTeaching America ‘Online’: Designing and delivering the Online Distance course ‘A History of the Blues’
The sixth post in the ‘Teaching America’ series is by Dr Christian O’Connell (University of Gloucestershire), author of Blues, How Do You Do? Paul Oliver and the Transatlantic Story of the Blues, who discusses the benefits to online distance learning when teaching the history of U.S. music.
Continue ReadingMore Bang for Your Buck: Teaching Nuclear History
The fifth post in the ‘Teaching America’ series is by Dr Malcolm Craig (University of Edinburgh) who reflects on his own approach to designing and teaching a course around nuclear history.
Continue ReadingExploring the French Caribbean and Joseph Zobel
Researching the life and works of the French Caribbean author Joseph Zobel has taken me all over the world and – as a direct result of my collaboration with the Eccles Centre at the British Library – led to what the Guardian called my “Indiana Jones Moment” but more on that later…
Continue ReadingAfrican Americans and Anti-Colonialism
The fourth post in the ‘Teaching America’ series is by Dr Nicholas Grant (University of East Anglia), author of the forthcoming monograph ‘We Shall Win Our Freedoms Together’: African Americans and Apartheid, 1945-1960, who discusses his approach to teaching a transnational history of African American Civil Rights.
Continue ReadingUS History as Myth-Busting
In the third post of the ‘Teaching America’ series Dr Andrew Hartman (Illinois State University), author of the forthcoming monograph A War for the Soul Of America: A History of the Culture Wars, discusses the ways in which graduate students can be encouraged to engage with ‘America as an idea’ in intellectual history modules.
Continue ReadingTeaching Radicalism
The second post in the ‘Teaching America’ series is by Dr Christopher Phelps (University of Nottingham), co-author of the new title Radicals in America: The U.S. Left since the Second World War, who reflects upon the intellectual advantages and challenges when faced with designing and teaching the history of U.S. radicalism.
Continue ReadingTeaching U.S Women’s History in British Universities: a Personal and Political History
The first post in our new HOTCUS-led ‘Teaching America’ series is by Dr Kate Dossett (University of Leeds) who reflects on her own experiences of designing a course on U.S. women’s history, and how she has encouraged British undergraduate students to consider how their own gender identity shapes their approach to the study of history.
Continue ReadingHOTCUS ‘Teaching America’ Introduction
When the idea was initially pitched during a committee meeting that the Historians of the Twentieth Century United States (HOTCUS) could produce a series for U.S Studies Online outlining how the history of the United States was being taught at universities the hope was to showcase both the breath and diversity of research and teaching currently taking place in academic institutions in the U.K. and abroad. I am delighted to say that this has been achieved. ‘Teaching America’ was designed by HOTCUS as a teaching resource for postgraduate and early career researchers in the American Studies community. The series consists of a number of posts written by academics from a range of historical disciplines, discussing pedagogical trends, methodological approaches, module design, and the challenges faced when teaching the history of the United States. By collaborating with U.S. Studies Online we hope to establish an open online resource that researchers in […]
Continue ReadingOver the Ice: Polar Exploration from the Air
For Americans, the spring of 1926 was an exciting time in long-distance aviation. The newspapers were full of thrilling tales of pioneering flights, including three aerial expeditions aiming for the North Pole. The excitement came to a head on 9 May 1926, when Richard E. Byrd, a young American naval aviator, returned to his expedition’s base at King’s Bay, Spitsbergen (Svalbard), after a flight of just over 15 hours, proclaiming that he and his co-pilot Floyd Bennett had become the first people to reach the North Pole by air. Byrd’s announcement triggered a patriotic outpouring in the American press, with headlines trumpeting the United States’ polar conquest. Byrd returned home a national hero, where he was met by cheering crowds and public accolades, including the Congressional Medal of Honor.
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