“You’re taking over our country” echoes longstanding national narratives and has become prominent once again in conservative discourse.
June, 2015
America’s Long History of Racial Fear
Calling Wednesday’s shootings in Charleston a “tragedy” makes this explosion of murderous violence seem like an accident. It isn’t.
A Rebellious Act: The Founding of Charleston’s African Church
The founding of Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church was itself a revolutionary act.
The Charleston Massacre and the Rape Myth of Reconstruction
If Dylann Roof is deranged, his derangement is deeply steeped in a history of white supremacy that has long expressed the threat of black economic and political power in sexual terms.
Reconstructing the American Tradition of Domestic Terrorism
Yesterday’s horrific murder of nine people worshipping at Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church replayed a central theme in American history. It is the question, fought for centuries with both words and weapons: to whom does this country belong?
The Trial and Execution of Ruth Blay
On the morning of June 14th, 1768, a group of young girls converged on Benjamin Clough’s barn, a makeshift schoolhouse in South Hampton, New Hampshire.
Harriet Tubman on the Twenty: Changing America’s Story
Last month, voters in an online poll conducted by the organization Women On 20s selected Harriet Tubman as their choice to be the first woman represented on the paper currency of the United States.
Lindsey Graham’s History Problem: John Calhoun, Strom Thurmond, and the Legacy of South Carolina Presidential Hopefuls
South Carolina Senators don’t have a good track record with White House runs.
When We Were Knights: Black Ring Tournaments in the Reconstruction Era
Emancipated African Americans eagerly seized the opportunity to participate in activities that may now seem surprising.
“Our boasted civilization is but a thin veneer”: Remembering the 1921 Tulsa Riots
In 1921, Tulsa, Oklahoma featured one of the nation’s most successful African American commercial and residential neighborhoods. By the evening of June 1st, Greenwood Avenue had been entirely destroyed by rampaging white rioters.