Comments on: And speaking of sausage parties…

By: Scent of a woman’s ISBN number? : Historiann : History and sexual politics, 1492 to the present

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 18:54:00 +0000

[...] NOTE: The title of this post is an homage to Francine Prose’s excellent 1998 article in Harper’s on the differences in the ways that male and female authors are read and reviewed, where they’re published, the number of awards and honors they win, and whether or not they’re slotted as “genre fiction” authors. We discussed this here in a post last spring, “And speaking of sausage parties…” [...]

By: In other diversity news: The New Yorker still safe for pale males : Historiann : History and sexual politics, 1492 to the present

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 03:43:00 +0000

[...] more on this issue, see “And speaking of sausage parties,” a post from last [...]

By: Historiann

Historiann — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 12:58:43 +0000

Indyanna sez: “what other field of inquiry thinks that its best work was done before people had given names and surnames?”

Indeed! Hillarious.

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 03:01:33 +0000

Yeah, even making due allowance for the entirely worthy “standing on the shoulders of giants” concept, what other field of inquiry thinks that its best work was done before people had given names and surnames? There really was quite a lot of soliloquizing going on in those nomination statements. Maybe we should go on there and run up some numbers for the six inquirers chaptered in Devoney Looser’s _British Women Writers and the Writing of History, 1670-1820_ (Hopkins, 2000), viz, Lucy Hutchinson, Mary Wortley Montagu, Charlotte Lennox, Catherine Macaulay, Hester Lynch Piozzi, and Jane Austen? They do it every year before the All-Star Game!

By: Historiann

Historiann — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 21:19:43 +0000

**HYOOOOGE eyeroll**

Whatever. I can’t get over how incredibly pretentious the recommendations over there are. Herotodus, Thucydides, and Tacitus? Gimme a break. No one but Classicists read them any more, so it just strikes me as ridiculous posturing for people on the early American history list.

Or, maybe I should write in TerTOOLian?

I remember in college I finally pulled down the 2 volumes of Gibbon’s _Rise and Fall_, mostly because of all of the hype. I couldn’t believe how boring it was, and from then on I’ve doubted any claims from current scholars that they like to curl up with books by historians who have been dead for more than 200+ years (unless those count as primary sources in their field of research, that is.

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 21:08:34 +0000

At H-OIEAHC, at last count, on “Top Ten Historians,” the numbers are something like 42/2!

By: Historiann

Historiann — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 15:21:32 +0000

Ellie, yeah–well, it’s HNN, which promulgates a very traditional vision of what history is and who writes it. To be fair, Rick Shenkman has asked me to contribute articles, and Cliopatria links here occasionally (and publishes Tenured Radical posts too.) But, the commenters over there seem like a very strange lot of non-professional enthusiasts who are extremely hostile to anything but history as it was written in 1950. I’ve never written anything for them because–well, I get plenty of hits over here, and why should I cast my pearls before swine, right?

I’ve sent recommendations in to Bonnie Goodman for her “Top Young Historians” feature, and she has followed up on some of them, so I endorse your strategy, and I encourage many of you to gang up and nominate some of the same people to get some movement on this issue. For myself right now, I guess I’m more into the notion of supporting (and creating new) rival communities for women historians and women’s historians, like the Berkshire Conference and my blog, along with other feminist history blogs. It’s such a relief not to have to have the same pointless arguments with stupid people.

By: Ellie

Ellie — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 15:12:18 +0000

Late to this party, but in case anyone is still reading the comments here, check out the HNN “Top Young Historians” list. Of the current 100 historians, 73 men, 27 women. This is a recognition for which people are nominated by anybody, so if you know any smart women historians, nominate them!!!

By: Vellum

Vellum — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 14:46:53 +0000

There you have a point.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 13:51:37 +0000

Vellum–you may be right. The key point for me is that The New Yorker was collaborating heavily in his makeover–whereas I find it difficult to believe that they’d do the same for women genre fiction authors like Danielle Steel! The New Yorker would apparently rather rehabilitate King than publish women’s literary fiction.