I understand and applaud the call for more diverse panels and perspectives, which is a running theme in criticism of #SHEAR2020.
I also think it's important to specify what those voices would contribute. Presence is necessary but not sufficient.
It's useful to remember that what began as a deep dive into the ways people view Jackson today (with the usual nods to memory, media, remembering, forgetting, distorting) became something else and then something else again.
The session lost its way.
There are many valid criticisms and differing perspectives about what was said, but perhaps this was because it became a flawed seminar in historiography, where those voices needed to be heard. I don't think that was the original purpose of the session.
It's not the fault of the critics that the session lost its way. You find the fault in the original paper. It lost focus and purpose. The ensuing discussion didn't help. I came to wonder what was going on ... is this an exercise on why "they" always get it wrong?
In turn the ensuing discussion has become broader and concerned with issues of institutional structure, professional practice in scholarly organizations, and defining membership in conversations.
That's really useful. But a single session can't do everything.
I think the broader conversation is one worth having ... as is one over networking, access, use of technology, etc. For example, technology allows us to come together virtually when we want, so why just have a convention at one time and place? Multiple platforms? Various times?
Why not use this moment to discuss how to reenvision these ways of sharing and discussing our work? Technology erases the limitation of meeting rooms and the cost of attendance; the physical meeting can serve an number of purposes, but let's think broadly.
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It's often asserted the as president Ulysses S. Grant destroyed the Ku Klux Klan.
The reality is not nearly as satisfying or uplifting to those who deplore white supremacist paramilitary terrorism as conducted primarily by veterans of the Confederate war effort.
The KKK became a shorthand descriptor for the many forms of white supremacist terrorism that slowly took organized form in the late 1860s. There were other massacres (Memphis) and attacks (New Orleans) against blacks and their white allies in the Reconstructing South.
By 1867 and 1868, when Black men in large numbers exercised the right to vote for the first time, white supremacist terrorism, often defined as KKK activity, targeted Black voters and Republican officeholders.
Visual portrayals of what happened in Wilmer McLean's parlor on April 9, 1865, at Appomattox Court House are worth some study.
Here's a simple early version: two generals, one table.
The table is a curious effort to bring together elements of the two tables involved in the event. Grant said at a brown wood oval table; Lee sat at a squarish marble table. Grant's chair was a swivel desk chair backed in leather, while Lee sat in a high-backed chair.
Yet it took a while for artists to include those four pieces of furniture, let alone to assign them to the general who used them.
As true Americans commemorate the anniversary of Lee's surrender to Grant at Appomattox, let's recall that the events of April 9 marked an end to one of the most successful pursuits in military history ... one that is often underappreciated.
In some sixteen days the US forces under Grant's command repulsed a breakout attempt, severed Confederate supply lines and railroads, forced the evacuation of Petersburg and the the Confederate capital at Richmond.
That's for starters.
They then outmarched a foe determined to escape, blocked any chance of the enemy combining forces in North Carolina, then headed the insurgents off before they could reach the protection of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
In the process the foe suffered nearly 50% losses.
Tomorrow is the anniversary of Robert E. Lee's surrender to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House.
Most of us recall the generous terms Grant offered Lee, which stood in contrast to his reputation as "Unconditional Surrender" Grant.
But what about Lee?
After all, on April 6, at the battle of Sailor's Creek, Lee watched as his army crumbled under US attacks. "My God, has the army dissolved?" Lee declared in desperation.
Lee was in dire straits.
Gone was any chance of uniting with Confederate forces under Joseph E. Johnston in North Carolina.
Gone also was the chance of dealing any sort of significant blow against his foe.
All that was left was to continue westward to the protection of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
A few notes on Ulysses S. Grant's personal involvement with the institution of slavery prior to the American Civil War for those who might be interested ...
Grant grew up in an antislavery home. As a boy his father had worked in a tannery owned by Owen Brown, who had a son named John. I bet you've heard of him.
As a boy Grant attended a preparatory school in Ripley, Ohio, run by Reverend John Rankin.
What else did Rankin run? A stop on the Underground Railroad.
Recall Eliza's fording the Ohio in *Uncle Tom's Cabin*?
The real life event took place in this vicinity. The Eliza in question was Eliza Harris.