History is Awesome!

My big plans for this first newsletter post were sidelined by still needing to do schoolwork, so this is both shorter and not quite in the format I intended it to be when envisioning it. It's also heavily influenced by book reviews due to my new found cashflow that allows for book purchases the nature of the posts I found this week.



Discussion Posts

sami writes The Great Cultural Appropriation Debate of Doom 18th Century Edition:

So, my history essay is about the extent to which Scottish culture was oppressed/suppressed after Union with England (and Wales, but realistically: England). See, the major counter-argument to this being the case that came out of my discussion with my lecturer is that the laws banning Scottish cultural elements - kilts, tartan generally, Gaelic, etc - were generally elements of Highland culture - and the Highlands were only a small part of Scotland, not all that well-regarded even by Scots.

The Highlands, after all, were seen as a backward, savage haven of paganism and popery and nobody liked them; the Highlanders who came to the Lowlands were poor and not that welcome, etc.

Book Reviews

oursin writes a book review: H G Cocks, Classified: the secret history of the personal column (2009)

And I am all for a book which lets people know that virtual relationships, or at least relationships not mediated within pre-existing f2f communities and social networks, have a much longer history than people think and are not just a product of the internet. And that a lot of the anxieties about them go back pretty much to the beginning.

oursin also reviews Kathy Davis, The Making of Our Bodies, Ourselves: How Feminism Travels Across Borders

Davis's discussion of the migrations of OBOS is also fascinating and provocative. She points out the attention that has been given to making sure that translations, adaptations, reworkings for particular cultural conditions, embody the spirit of the original but aren't bogged down by irrelevant specifics, some of which have very different meanings for other settings (for example, she mentions that concerns around abortion in e.g. Bulgaria are more about its having been the major form of birth control than an individual right under threat as in the US, and that knowledge and availability of other forms of contraception are desired). She also strongly emphasises that there are strong local feminist traditions worldwide - that it isn't a US export or missionary activity - but that there is a constant to and fro flow of ideas from country to country, that ideas are taken and examined and adapted or transformed.

naraht writes a book review of Shaun Tan's The Arrival and The Balkans: A Short History by Mark Mazower

Having so far only read the introduction, I am already looking forward to what promises to be a fascinating deconstruction of the ways that western historians have imposed their own preoccupations on the Balkan region (in which he includes Greece, which I had never quite realized was part of the Balkans). Here I offer a medium-sized excerpt from the introduction:

Off-journal Links of Interest

Via death_worm
Daily Mail pic-spam of the Turing Bombe, the part-electronic, part-mechanical code-breaking machine

Sound of long-lost Ancient Greek instruments recreated by computer experts

The epigonion, a harp-like musical instrument, was last played in Ancient Greece. But computer scientists have resurrected its sound as part of a project to conjure up an orchestra of long-lost instruments.

They don't know exactly what it looked like but they have used historical sources to re-create what it would have sounded like.

{That last sentence kinda hurts my head.}

Interesting (LJ) Communities Related To History

history_talk
vintagephoto

History Carnivals

The current history carnival is at Frog in a Well. The next one will be at Disability Studies, Temple U on May 1.

The latest Carnivaleque focuses this month on Ancient & Medieval studies. Next month's is Early Modern period, but there is no one yet signed up to host it.

The Military History Carnival is getting it's footing again, this month at American Presidents. I'm a little unclear where and when the next one is. Follow this tag for more information.

The current Carnival of Genealogy focuses on uncles, biological, adopted, and "in quotations". I'm unclear on when and where the next one is. Check the homepage for more details.



I hope to have a broader assortment of posts next week. If you come across anything you want linked, or write anything in your space you'd like me to link, please let me know in comments or email me at anna@annaoverseas.com . However, please don't hesitate to link anything historical you write or are interested in, or start any discussion, in the community itself. I'm just hoping to highlight posts I find 'round the journal-sphere with this, not replace other people's posts with it.