Comments on: Women’s History Month book club: Judith Bennett’s “History Matters” Part III at Tenured Radical

By: Historiann

Historiann — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 13:31:13 +0000

Thanks, Vicki–I hope you enjoy the book. Perhaps it will arrive in time to join the last two conversations.

By: Vicki

Vicki — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 09:57:20 +0000

Dear Historiann, I am a cultural studies late bloomer in Germany, and your blog keeps opening new doors of insightfulness for me, so I add my voice to the chorus and say thank you for this space. I am awaiting my copy of Bennett as I write.;-))

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 14:40:32 +0000

Thanks, Historiann. I check it out 2, 3, 4 times a day, as we used to say in Philly… !

By: Historiann

Historiann — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 14:03:59 +0000

Mamie and Indyanna–I’m sure the sense of community is one of the things many writers will write about. It’s one of the things I think is most important–in my current job, I work with other women’s historians and other early Americanists, but I too once worked in a department and university where I was fairly isolated. For me, the discussions here about other professional issues are the kinds of conversations I don’t have with a wider circle outside of the blog. I really appreciate getting the advice and perspectives of commenters from all over!

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 13:28:36 +0000

Yeah, there must be a dozen(s) of people who do what I do in this state (Early [North] American/Atlantic History), but the oxygen often gets pretty depleted in this little corner of the tank nevertheless. That’s where the blog comes in for me. I’m not really a blog kind of person, but this one is a pretty essential oxygen source now. So the r/t should maybe have a consumer dimension as well as a producer dimension.

By: Mamie

Mamie — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 05:38:03 +0000

I do not blog, but I read this CFP. I think it overlooks one of the most interesting possibilities of blogging. I do not work at an R1 university. Nor do I live in a community with multiple universities. For many years, I was the only person in my entire state trained in my general field (North American women’s history). There are now at least two other scholars in the field in this state, but neither resides within 50 miles of me. The discussions at Historiann provide me with a kind of substitute scholarly community. I have lived in communities and worked at institutions where there were real-world communities of feminist historians, and I know how enriching and, well, reassuring, that can be. I think the CFP misses that whole dimension of blogging by focusing on what it means for the blogger–not on what blogs can mean for the readers. BTW, thanks, Historiann, for fostering such a high level of discussion.