Ph.D. Candidate David Evans Reflects on War in Afghanistan

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UConn PhD candidate David L. Evans has written an insightful article in response to the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, which can be found on pages 48-51 of the latest issue of Passport, The Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR) Review. In “The United States Did Not Go to War in Afghanistan,” Evans, who served in the U.S. Marines between 2002-2010 was stationed in Afghanistan in 2008, describes the political and civic meanings of the U.S. military presence in Central Asia. In so doing, Evans brings into question what determines and qualifies as military conflict. Evans writes, “Put bluntly, over the last twenty years the involvement of most Americans when it came to Afghanistan and the wider wars on terror centered on performance and ritual. Honoring the troops and veterans remains the hollowed-out civic religion of the country.”

This article is a must-read. A job well done!

Alum Jorell Meléndez-Badillo Interviewed by The Abusable Past

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Recent UConn History PhD graduate, Jorell Meléndez-Badillo, details the intricacies of the labor movement in Puerto Rico alongside questions of race, gender, and knowledge production in an interview with the online collective, The Abusable Past.

The interview is based on his his first book, The Lettered Barriada: Workers, Archival Power, and the Politics of Knowledge in Puerto Rico (2021), which chronicles how a group of self-educated workers theorized liberation in the wake of U.S. occupation and amidst the changing conditions and terms of exploitation. This interview is an insightful foray into the cultural landscape of labor politics in Puerto Rico. Congratulations on a groundbreaking book and fantastic interview!

Interview is here:

Knowledge Produced in the Margins 

Undergraduate Honors Student Spotlight: Arieta Jakaj

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Camerata Florence ImageUConn ’21 graduate Arieta Jakaj worked with UConn History Professor Ken Gouwens on their senior thesis. Their project traces the intellectual history of the Renaissance and ancient Greece musical forms. Exciting work! 

Arieta Jakaj, “Cosmic Harmony and the Death of Music: Florentine Music Theory and Its Influences During the Late 16th Century (1573-1587)”

Thesis Advisor: Ken Gouwens

The leaders of Florence’s late Renaissance musical scene — the Florentine Camerata or Camerata de’ Bardi (1573-1587) — believed that music in their own time was dying. To help remedy this, they wanted to bring back Ancient Greek musical forms and theories. Did the Renaissance music masters of late-16th Century Florence know that they could never truly replicate the legendary musical past of Ancient Greece? It is clear from the writings of theorists in Cinquecento Italy that they were very aware of their limitations; Ancient Greek music could never be fully replicated. However, the members of the Florentine Camerata still reflected on Ancient times and sought to pull the past to their present. The Camerata’s focus on the past seemed to represent an ever-present need, a longing, for the past to be real and palpable sonically in Cinquecento Italy. Out of this arose a more formidable question: With little music documentation and notation left from Ancient Greece, separated by a span of over a millennium and a half, why did these musicians of the Italian Renaissance decide to revitalize Ancient forms, knowing they could never achieve exactly what the surviving literature promised? During my investigation, I intend to explore the key Greek musical thought that survived from Ancient times and which aspects of this thought appealed to the Camerata. Furthermore, I shall analyze the debates that ruled the Camerata’s discussion and the results of their attempts to recapture the sound of Ancient Greece. It is my intention to evaluate the validity of the conclusion that I have come to during my research, which is that the intellectuals of the Florentine Camerata were concerned with the power of music to develop the soul and wanted to imitate the Ancient Greeks to capture the power of that influence, all while still experimenting and testing the boundaries of Renaissance music.

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Spotlight: Jenifer Gaitán

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Image of UConn Storrs Campus UConn ’21 graduate Jenifer Gaitán worked with UConn History Professor Ariel Mae Lambe on their senior thesis. Their project uses a multi-layered methodology that examines the experiences of first-generation Latinx college students.  Jenifer majored in History with a minor in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. A job well done! 

Jenifer Gaitán, “Salir Adelante: Exploring the Systems of Support of First-Generation Latinx College Students in Their Pursuit of Higher Education”

Thesis Advisor: Ariel Mae Lambe

This thesis explores both the obstacles and systems of support of first-generation Latinx college students as they complete their undergraduate education. The history of the Latinx community in the US and their fight for education is detailed. An analysis is provided of the impact of social, cultural, and economic conditions and the role of immigration in the lives of this student demographic. Finally, this thesis contributes to this area of study through the analysis of ten qualitative interviews that were conducted of first-generation Latinx college students in the last year. Several obstacles that students faced were related to finances, gendered expectations, serving as the middleperson between their families and U.S. institutions. Students identified both formal and informal sources of support, which came from student organizations, mentors, their peers, as well as workshops and presentations. These student’s experiences illustrate the importance of having culturally competent resources and material support available in the form of scholarships, computers, and textbooks to ease financial and other burdens.

 

History Professors Testify about Connecticut’s Colonial Past

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On Thursday, November 18, 2021–the Thursday before Thanksgiving–State Historian and UConn Professor Walt Woodward and Professor Manisha Sinha gave testimony before the Connecticut state legislature on the John Mason statue at the State Capitol. John Mason, considered a founder of the Connecticut colony, set fire to a Pequot community in 1637, claiming the lives of at least 400 people. Anthropologists, members of the Mohegan, Eastern Pequot, Mashantucket tribes, and a descendant of  John Mason convened for over 2 hours to discuss the removal of his statue. This discussion examined  the complexities of history, memory, symbolism, and the violence integral to the story of the making of the United States.  Professor Woodward and Professor Sinha grappled with the meaning of the statues t for the teaching and remembering of  history. Both are cited in this excellent CT Mirror article that recaps the state session. Prof. Walt Woodward is also quoted in the December 11 issue of The Economist, in the article “How the culture wars can show what’s right with America.”

 

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Spotlight: Michael Francomano

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Image for Nuclear Weapons in Marshall IslandsUConn ’21 graduate Michael Francomano worked with UConn History Professor Alexis Dudden on their senior thesis that explores the legal discourses around nuclear weapons in the twentieth century. A job well done! 

Michael Francomano, “The Influence of the United States on Nuclear Laws”

Thesis Advisor: Alexis Dudden

The United States government has influenced the laws surrounding the use of nuclear weapons from the moment of their first use against a civilian population in 1945. These efforts include countless measures taken to absolve the United States from responsibility for their actions. This is especially seen in the Marshall Islands where US government efforts to abjure legal responsibility to help those directly impacted by radioactive fallout resulting from weapons testing between 1945 and 1962 abound as do efforts to attend the natives that were completely displaced from their home islands destroyed in the name of nuclear testing. These actions span to current day warfare. In so doing, the United States government defies international laws prohibiting the use of nuclear weapons in war in the form of armor piercing rounds of munitions made out of depleted uranium (used as recently as 2015 in Syria). The legality of these weapons is something that remains a gray area in international law, and a major contributor to that is the fact that the United States has used its power and history with nuclear weapons to influence the creation of new precedents and disregard the laws that have already been in place.

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Spotlight: Michael Fox

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Image of Queen Elizabeth in Parliament

UConn ’21 graduate Michael Fox worked with UConn History Professor Meredith Rusoff on their senior thesis that explores  freedom of speech in early modern England. A job well done! 

Michael Fox, ““A Strange Thing for the Foot to Guide the Head”: Freedom of Speech in Elizabethan Parliaments

Thesis Advisor: Meredith Rusoff

Freedom of speech is a right that many in the United States, and the Western world, take for granted as something that is critical for any modern democratic society to function. However, this has not been the case for the vast majority of Western, and human, history. It is during the early-modern period, specifically the Enlightenment, that concepts such as freedom of speech were developed, and eventually became fully encoded in law. Britain, more specifically England, led the way in the development of freedom of speech within its Parliament, and the practice of common law. Similar to how the government itself evolved in England, so too did its concept of what rights and liberties could be exercised.

New Book: The Transcendentalists and Their World

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Tomorrow, our colleague Robert Gross, Draper Chair of Early American History Emeritus, is publishing with Farrar, Straus & Giroux his long-awaited history of Emerson, Thoreau and their circle in Concord: The Transcendentalists and Their World. A lovely first review came out in the Wall Street Journal a few days ago, with many more surely on the way.

There will also be many talks about the book in the coming weeks, starting with a book launch at the Boston Public Library on November 9. A list follows below.

Nov. 9, 2021: Boston Public Library: https://bpl.bibliocommons.com/events/6144be5d257a2d290006efd1

Nov. 10, 2021: Concord Museum: https://concordmuseum.org/events/transcendentalists-and-their-world-with-robert-gross/cover-the-transcendentalists-and-their-world/

Nov. 30, 2021: Harvard Bookstore: https://www.harvard.com/event/virtual_event_robert_gross/

Dec. 2 and 9, 2021: 92 Street Y: https://www.92y.org/class/robert-a-gross

Dec. 5, 2021: Thoreau Society/Thoreau Farm: https://www.thoreausociety.org/event/author-talk-robert-gross

Dec. 13, 2021: Massachusetts Historical Society: http://www.masshist.org/calendar/event?event=3573

Dec. 15, 2021: Salem Athenaeum: https://salemathenaeum.net/event/robert-gross-the-transcendentalists-and-their-world/

Jan. 13, 2022: Massachusetts Historical Society: https://www.colonialsociety.org/calendar

We hope to have Professor Gross back to campus sometime in the spring to talk about the book as well.  Congratulations!

Prof. Micki McElya Contributes to NYT Article

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The New York Times has once again turned to UConn History Professor Micki McElya for her insights into the national politics of mourning, memorials, and memory. In a recent piece on The Tomb of the Unknowns–scheduled for public opening for the first time in 73 years this week–Prof. McElya indicates that  “Arlington became a site that every single American can claim a relationship to,” in large part because of the tomb.  In the article, Prof. McElya details the debates about veteran burial and remembrance, culminating in this tomb functioning as a political symbol imbued with ever-changing meanings about military service and leadership. Read more in the  excellent NYT article and consider taking a look at Prof. McElya’s award-winning book, The Politics of Mourning: Death and Honor in Arlington National Cemetery.

Prof. Fiona Vernal Participates in Hartford Heritage Series

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UConn History Professor Fiona Vernal delivered a talk on Shade Tobacco Stories: Land, Labor, and Immigration in the CT Tobacco Valley. As a part of Capitol Community College’s virtual history heritage series, Prof. Vernal gives us a deeper appreciation of the local histories that go forgotten between the larger national stories that influence yet take center stage in the narratives we tell about the past. She illustrates the connections and collaborations that people of West Indian, Caribbean, and African descent fostered as they labored and organized to create political communities and social networks.  The making of tobacco culture in CT is one that Prof. Vernal details with passion and dedication.

Listen to her talk on the CT Old State House page and read this Hartford Courant article that chronicles the work of historians throughout the region laboring to bring the history of Hartford and its surrounding areas to the fore. The whole series is on the CT Old State House page!