2021-2022 Book Celebration
On Friday, March 11, 2022 the History Department and the Chabraja Center for Historical Studies held their annual joint book celebration and reception as part of the weekend events for prospective graduate students. This in-person event was well attended by members of the History Department and prospective grads visiting campus. Copies of books by Northwestern historians published in 2021 and 2022 were on display and CCHS Director Jonathon Glassman introduced each author before they said a few works about their book. The publications ranged widely through time and space, from Scott Sowerby’s three books on seventeenth-century England and Melissa Macauley’s Distant Shores: Colonial Encounters on China’s Maritime Frontier to Lauren Stokes’s Fear of the Family: Guest Workers and Family Migration in the Federal Republic of Germany. Americanists were prominent in the authorial group, including Henry Binford’s book on nineteenth-century urban history, Kate Masur’s work on the “first civil rights movement,” Susan Pearson’s history of the American birth certificate, and Kevin Boyle’s exploration of the 1960s. The books of those four authors who could not attend – Paul Gillingham, Danny Greene, David Schoenbrun, and Helen Tilly -- will be celebrated next year, along with the exciting new books that will appear in 2022-23.
Henry Binford – From Improvement to City Planning: Spatial Management in Cincinnati from the Early Republic through the Civil War Decade
Revolutionary industry brought with it a multitude of new needs. In his book, From Improvement to City Planning: Spatial Management in Cincinnati from the Early Republic through the Civil War Decade (Temple UP, 2021), Henry BINFORD looks to Cincinnati, Ohio to explore how the novel economic, social, and political conditions of urban living contributed to the rise of city planning – and all that comes with it.
Kevin Boyle – The Shattering: America in the 1960s
Kevin BOYLE’s The Shattering: America in the 1960s (Norton, 2021) transports us to a decade of massive change and civil unrest. The 60s ushered in movements surrounding civil rights, reproductive justice, and sexuality. All of which deeply impacted that historical moment and continue to stir divisive conversations today.
Melissa MACAULEY – Distant Shores: Colonial Encounters on China’s Maritime Frontier
In an attempt to confront the assumption that China was falling behind their European counterparts, Melissa MACAULEY introduces us to the nautical expeditions of the Chaozhouese. Her book Distant Shores: Colonial Encounters on China’s Maritime Frontier (Princeton UP, 2021) explores the complex network that aided and sustained major development and growth of the Chinese colonial reach and challenges common understandings of Chinese History.
Kate MASUR – Until Justice Be Done: America’s First Civil Rights Movement, From the Revolution to Reconstruction
Kate MASUR’s Until Justice Be Done: America’s First Civil Rights Movement, From the Revolution to Reconstruction (Norton, 2021) introduces us to the pre-Civil War demand for equality. Years before the Civil War divided the nation, African American activists questioned the contradictory laws of free states that disempowered free African Americans. In partnership with white allies, these activists transcended their mundane daily occupations and worked towards equality during a time when that word still needed to be defined.
Susan J. PEARSON – The Birth Certificate: An American History
It seems unfair that birth certificates contain so much information about individuals, but we have so little information about the certificates themselves. In her book The Birth Certificate: An American History (U of North Carolina Press, 2021) Susan J. PEARSON attempts to remedy this by delving into the history of these significant documents. Using legal, social, and political historical lens Pearson aims to uncover the reasoning behind and the implementation of the birth certificate as a societal document used for understanding one’s relationship to American citizenship and all that it entails.
Scott SOWERBY – Revolutionizing Politics: Culture and Conflict in England, 1620-1660, edited with Paul D. Halliday and Eleanor Hubbard
Revolutionizing Politics: Culture and Conflict in England, 1620-1660 (Manchester UP, 2021) by Scott SOWERBY and his co-editors Paul D. Halliday and Eleanor Hubbard, is a collaborative approach to understanding and exploring the 17th century. Each chapter broaches a distinct topic and works to collectively and skillfully develop a broad cultural, political, and social understanding of mid-seventeenth century history.
Scott SOWERBY - The Memoirs of Sir Daniel Fleming of Rydal Hall from 1633 to 1688, edited with Noah McCormack
Scott SOWERBY and his co-editor Noah McCormack use their book The Memoirs of Sir Daniel Fleming of Rydal Hall from 1633-1688 (Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society to give readers an intimate glimpse into the 17th century through the compiled writings of Sir Daniel Fleming, a prominent Englishman. The authors use Sir Fleming’s memoirs to grant a unique, first-hand perspective of the historical goings-on of the rambunctious time period that was the 17th century.
Scott SOWERBY – The State Trials and the Politics of Justice in the Later Stuart England, edited with Bryan Cowan
State Trials in Late Stuart England were not only enjoyable to watch, but revolutionized the British approach to justice. The State Trials and the Politics of Justice in the Later Stuart England (Boydell & Brewer, 2021) by Scott SOWERBY and co-editor Brian Cowan delves into the ramifications of introducing these new-fangled state trials and utilizes historical accounts to demonstrate the societal precedents set regarding the definition of justice and its execution.
Lauren STOKES – Fear of the Family: Guest Workers and Family Migration in the Federal Republic of Germany
In 1955 West Germany launched the guest worker programs that would turn its economy into a global powerhouse. In Fear of the Family, Lauren Stokes immerses us in the political world that infused those programs with racial, gender, and ethnic dynamics centered on Germans’ fears of foreign families. And she shows us how those families tried to counter the fears that those policies created in their corners of the new Germany.