Although Juneteenth commemorates the end of slavery in the United States, the date the holiday observes, June 19, 1865, came more than two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation, when Texas finally received word that slavery had ended. It may come as a surprise, but President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation did not effectively free […]
Department of History
Telling History
The Pro Bene Meritis award is the highest honor bestowed by the College of Liberal Arts. Since 1984, the annual award has been given to alumni, faculty members and friends of the college who are committed to the liberal arts, have made outstanding contributions in professional or philanthropic pursuits or have participated in service related to the college. […]
The Best Teachers are the Best Researchers: A Q&A with Jorge Cañizares-Esguerra
For the recognition of his work in mentoring graduate students, University of Texas at Austin history professor Jorge Cañizares-Esguerra has been presented with The Nancy Lyman Roelker Mentorship Award. This award commemorates educators that train, teach, and inspire students in a deeply meaningful and impactful way. Cañizares-Esguerra is the first to receive this award at […]
Fight Like a Girl: How Women’s Activism Shapes History
Alice Embree doesn’t know what came over her the first time she stood up against injustice. She just knew it was the right thing to do. Along with her friends Karen and Glodine and the rest of the Austin High School drill squad, Embree had just sat down to order at a restaurant in Corpus […]
Tropical Storm: How Cuba Sent Revolutionary Waves Around the World
When it comes to staging a revolution, timing is everything. In 1959 an island nation of 7 million revolted against its U.S.-backed dictator, and with its subsequent export of revolution to Latin America became a major driver of U.S. foreign policy during the Cold War. In a story as compelling as it is complex, Professor […]
Telling a Good Story
The Pro Bene Meritis award is the highest honor bestowed by the College of Liberal Arts. Since 1984, the annual award has been given to alumni, faculty members and friends of the college who are committed to the liberal arts, have made outstanding contributions in professional or philanthropic pursuits or have participated in service related to the college. […]
A Monumental Decision: What to do About Jefferson Davis and the Challenges of Commemoration?
Let’s talk about statues, or one statue in particular, and all of the trouble a cold, hard, unfeeling thing can cause. Imagine you are the president of a very large, prestigious institution, representative of the spirit and aspirations of a region. Your greatest benefactor, a former regent and a veteran, stipulates in his will the […]
Remaking ‘Roots’
“This is a historian’s dream,” says Daina Ramey Berry, an associate professor of history at The University of Texas at Austin, who served as a technical adviser for the remaking of the television miniseries “Roots.” It will premiere on Memorial Day, airing over four consecutive nights. The A&E Networks’ HISTORY, A&E and Lifetime channels will […]
The Campaign for Your Vote: Just Add Brand Power
After months of being bombarded by pollsters, campaign ads and the most outlandish sound bites on repeat, the moment will come for you to finally cast your ballot. Whom will you choose? “The presidency is the one office that represents the American people: all their wishes, dreams, desires, hopes, fears and everything else,” says history […]
What’s So Funny About the Liberal Arts?
We’ve all heard the jokes about liberal arts majors, inspired by stereotypes that students in the humanities, social sciences and languages are destined to lives of underemployment: The science major asks, “Why does it work?” The engineering major asks, “How does it work?” The business major asks, “How much will it cost?” The liberal arts […]
All Grown Up
What it Means to be an Adult Chances are at some point in your life, you have been told to “grow up” or “start acting your age.” Faced with the pressures of paying bills, holding down a steady job and frequenting home improvement stores, it’s easy to see why adulthood may have lost some of […]
Bridge to Somewhere
Connecting STEM and the Humanities to Fix America’s Failing Infrastructure The next time you get behind the wheel, consider this: The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) gave our major urban highways a big, fat “D” on their infrastructure report card. A “D” on a report card usually means you’re getting grounded, and in a […]
‘15 Minute History’ Lauded as One of the Best Podcasts of 2014
Since its launch in July 2013, UT Austin’s “15 Minute History” has topped the iTunes U charts more than 20 times, surpassing content produced by organizations such as NASA, Smithsonian Libraries, TED and Harvard University. Selected as one of iTunes U Best Podcasts of 2014, “15 Minute History” features short, accessible discussions from faculty members […]
Op-Ed Project Fellows Address Challenges African Americans Still Face Today
Turn to the op-ed pages of any major newspaper, and you’ll see how writers are wielding the power of the written word to keep people honest, to speak out about injustices, to shake readers out of apathy. You’re also likely to see the article was most likely written by a man. Only 10 to 20 […]
History Professor Wins Prestigious Book Award
History Professor Seth Garfield received the Bolton-Johnson Prize Honorable Mention Award for his book In Search of the Amazon: Brazil, the United States, and the Nature of a Region (Duke University Press, Dec. 2013). The award was announced earlier this month at the annual conference of the American Historical Association in New York City. According to the […]
15 Minute History Named Best Podcast of 2014
iTunes U has selected 15 Minute History, produced by the University of Texas at Austin’s Department of History, as one of the Best Podcasts of 2014. The podcast features short, accessible discussions from UT faculty members and graduate students. The topics are wide-ranging and likely to intrigue any history buff. Subjects are drawn from the […]
Judy Perkins on Finding Joy in Life and Learning
The Pro Bene Meritis Award is the highest honor bestowed by the College of Liberal Arts at The University of Texas at Austin. First granted in 1984, it is given each spring to alumni, faculty and friends of the college who are committed to the liberal arts, have made outstanding contributions in professional or philanthropic […]
Pulitizer Finalist Tells Extraordinary Stories of Ordinary People
The Pulitzer Prize nominating jury has named Jacqueline Jones, chair of the Department of History at The University of Texas at Austin, a 2014 Pulitzer Prize finalist in history for her book, A Dreadful Deceit: The Myth of Race From the Colonial Era to Obama’s America. The nomination surprised Jones, who didn’t know her publisher […]
On This Pearl Harbor Anniversary, Our Relationship with Japan is Changing Again
Seventy-three years ago on December 7 marked the beginning of a new era in world history. After what President Franklin Roosevelt called a “dastardly attack” on our naval fleet at Pearl Harbor, the United States went to war with Japan. For the next four years, young Americans fought some of the most brutal air, sea […]
Regents Honor Outstanding Teaching
Four liberal arts professors received the 2014 Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Awards. They were among the 27 faculty award winners of the UT System Board of Regents’ highest teaching honor, which recognizes extraordinary educators from system institutions. The awards program is one of the nation’s largest monetary teaching recognition programs in higher education, honoring outstanding performance in the […]
Normandy Scholars Celebrate 25th Anniversary
Each year, 20 UT Austin students of different backgrounds and majors are selected to study the causes, conduct, consequences and contemporary representations of World War II. This year marks the 25th anniversary of the Frank Denius Normandy Scholar Program (NSP), which was established in 1989. To date, more than 500 undergraduates have benefited from this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Normandy Scholars receive […]
Thomas Jefferson’s Qur’an
It was a chance discovery of a 1782 broadside—advertising a play performed in Baltimore about the Prophet Muhammad—that piqued the curiosity of Denise Spellberg, professor of history and Middle Eastern Studies. She wondered, why did Americans perform this play during the Revolutionary War? More importantly, the historian of Islamic civilization asked, what did early Americans know […]
New Department Focuses on Latino, Mexican American Experience
Building Upon a 44-Year History of Mexican American Studies at UT A new academic department that takes a comprehensive look at the lives, cultures and histories of Mexican American and Latino populations has been established at The University of Texas at Austin. The Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies (MALS) will ultimately offer undergraduate […]
Millennial Nation
A Generational Look at Education, Money and Work Empathetic. Impatient. Innovative. Unfocused. Rational. Naive. Excited. These are the words millennials in the College of Liberal Arts use when they’re asked to describe themselves. However, it’s a question they’re not often asked. Plenty of people, from journalists to researchers to employers, are looking to define who […]
Q&A with Beth Mooney
Banking on Liberal Arts Beth Mooney, History ’77, is the chairman and CEO of KeyCorp, making her the first female chief of a top 20 U.S. bank. Headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, she oversees more than 15,000 employees and $91 billion in assets. She has been named one of the most powerful women in banking by […]