Migration, Madness, and Labor in Postemancipation New Orleans
These scientific servants of elite interests created a vision of the migrant body that perfectly matched the ideal working body of slavery that must be kept at labor to avoid illness.
Tag: race
“JIM, (alias James Boyd;)”: Enslaved Migrant Laborers in the American North
The Trump administration’s immigration policies have invited numerous comparisons to nineteenth-century regulations of enslaved persons. These comparisons will continue so long as the state retains the power to circumscribe a person’s mobility and employment opportunities through the policing of their legal status.
A Voice Not Heard at Home
To the present and past Mexican farmworker families of Tulare County: I write for you and walk alongside you. Mis vecinos, you are right. You belong here, just as your history of endurance and resilience belongs in our archives.
Call for Contributors: “Recovering Queer Histories in Unexpected Places”
The Activist History Review invites proposals for our May 2019 issue, “Recovering Queer Histories in Unexpected Places.”
Liberating the Young Scholar
I always share that I am a student who struggled. My kindergarten teacher told my parents that I would never pass the first grade.
The Problem of White People, with Insight from St. Paul
“I’m proud to be white,” someone recently told me. He interjected the comment in a contentious political conversation. I responded by advocating “more caution” in expression. The exchange fizzled without resolution. Yet this phrase, “proud to be white,” continues to disturb. My conversation partner was no white supremacist. But his chosen phrase would have fooled many. What lies within it is a key for understanding a threatening and intractable problem of American society: what I call “the problem of white people.”
Call for Contributors: Making Brett Kavanaugh – Masculinity in America
The Activist History Review seeks articles on the historical and present-day construction of masculinity in the United States and its significance for politics, society, economics, and culture.
Academic Racism: The Repression of Marginalized Voices in Academia
Several years ago, during a tenure-track search, I asked two questions – two questions which I ask of every scholar applying for a position with our institution. The first is innocent enough: “How important is racial/ethnic diversity in your scholarship and teaching?” Not surprisingly, all enthusiastically answer in the affirmative. Then I ask my second question: “Which scholars and/or books from racial and ethnic minorities do you include on your syllabus and why?” Here is when the squirming begins, revealing the candidate’s lack of academic rigor.
Give Racism a Chance
I started the Slants nearly a decade ago because I wanted to change people’s assumptions about Asian Americans. When you combine the great discomfort that people have when talking about racial injustice to the fact that the Asian American experience is rarely considered in these discussions, I realized that opportunities to do so would be extremely rare. I wanted to give racism a chance—a chance for discussing its existence in a way that would be compelling, honest, and yet, subversive.
Not My Right: Black Gun Ownership and Equality
Many Americans view self-defense as a natural right. However, African Americans have a long history of being denied the right to armed protection in a society that has sought to undergird white supremacy.
