Dear Bush Family and Clinton Family, In particular: Jed Bush, I know George W. Bush has recently encouraged you to run for President next time around. Hillary Clinton, I know people have expressed hopes that you too will run for this office, and based on some of your actions, there have been speculations that you might.Continue reading “An Open Letter and Request to the Bush and Clinton Family – Please Do Not Run For Office”
Monthly Archives: November 2014
An Open Letter to the Texas State Historical Association – It’s Time to Include LGBTs
Dear TSHA, First, let me express my profound appreciation for the goldmine of information found in The Handbook of Texas. I regularly use this free, online reservoir of knowledge when further learning about the geopolitical area called Texas and when preparing lessons for my students, especially as I am now teaching Texas History. My concernContinue reading “An Open Letter to the Texas State Historical Association – It’s Time to Include LGBTs”
Disguised Racism?: A Very Brief Analysis of a Postwar Image
This postwar image and ones like it regularly appear in textbooks. Scholars use such images to make arguments about how new technologies made housework less time-consuming and advertising made these appealing necessities. Other arguments focus on the sexism of having a Woman use the vacuum in this advertisement – a Woman who is wearing an apron andContinue reading “Disguised Racism?: A Very Brief Analysis of a Postwar Image”
Amazon’s “Echo” and the White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy
Earlier this afternoon I was watching this short advertisement for Amazon’s latest product: (Email subscribers, you might need to visit my webpage to see the video.) While watching this short video, I was at first intrigued and wonder if it is better than Apple’s Siri. Then, without meaning to, I noticed the rampant normalcy and perpetuationContinue reading “Amazon’s “Echo” and the White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy”
“The Day The Music Cried”
Election results are pretty much in. As usual, voter turnout is extremely low. As of 2012, Texas had 13,000,000+ people registered to vote (and certainly many more in the recent pushes to get more people registered) out of an eligible population of around 19,000,000. Less than 5,000,000 of these people actually used the number one way toContinue reading ““The Day The Music Cried””
Go Vote! 2014 Elections
If you are reading this, please vote on Tuesday, November 4, 2014, if you were unable to use early voting. Voting is even more important because Republicans, the Tea Party, and Big Money absolutely do not want you to vote (especially if you are a Woman, Black, Hispanic, Asian, LGBT/Queer, disabled, etc) and have done and areContinue reading “Go Vote! 2014 Elections”
The Nature of History, History as Entity vs. Example, and Texas History
Teaching Texas History for the first time this semester has provided much to think about, especially questions revolving around both “What is Texas History?” and “What makes something ‘Texas History’”? Another way of looking at these questions is to ask, what gives a place its own history? Take the boundaries of the geopolitical area calledContinue reading “The Nature of History, History as Entity vs. Example, and Texas History”
Film as Historical Source: Some Very Brief Notes
Unfortunately, film–as text, as cultural artifact, as legitimate and rigorous primary source–remains undervalued and looked down upon. Historians in general remain too wedded to the archive. Archives, however, do not provide unmediated or unbiased reservoirs of untainted, pure knowledge. Archives privilege those papers that have survived and those people who were able to and choseContinue reading “Film as Historical Source: Some Very Brief Notes”
Dr. Andrew Joseph Pegoda 