The past is present
While the realities of 2025 are in some ways unprecedented, Americans have felt this way before. The history of the late 1960s–early 1970s—assassinations, the Vietnam War, the Nixon presidency—reminds us that previous generations pushed back against what felt like insurmountable challenges.
The next chair of the Democratic National Committee will likely come from the Upper Midwest. To understand the politics of that region, we need to better appreciate the tradition of progressive, populist politics from Democrats in the Midwest.
If America’s greatness is its love of freedom, who held the firehoses in Birmingham? Who wielded clubs on Edmund Pettus Bridge?
On July 18, 2024, Donald Trump officially accepted the Republican Party’s nomination as its candidate for president. While there was no shortage of unconventional speeches at the Republican National Convention (RNC) held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, one speech stuck out. Merely an hour before Trump capped off his four-day coronation, Hulk Hogan, the former star of... Continue Reading →
The United States has almost always been a very politically divided nation. Conservative majorities on the Supreme Court are mistakenly viewed as unique to recent years, but they are really the norm in American history. So too is political polarization the norm.
See how to schedule and organize a Reacting to the Past Game, with examples from After a Long Battle: Congressional Responses to the AIDS Epidemic, 1982-1985.
This course surveys the history of illness and medicine in the US with a focus on viral pandemics, the developments of treatments and prevention, and the experiences of patients, families, medical professionals, researchers, activists, and politicians.
Interested in adding a historical game to your history class but don't know where to start? Adding a Reacting to the Past game can be a great way to engage students and delve into specific historical events.
When Jennifer Lopez sang Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land” at Joe Biden's presidential inauguration in January of this year, it marked the latest use of Woody Guthrie's much-contested song. The history of "This Land Is Your Land," from the many versions of the song to the even more varied responses to it, raise important questions about what a national anthem is—and what it might do in the discordant politics and culture of the United States.
The parallels between the civil rights movement of the early 1960s and the 2020 uprising can situate Gov. DeSantis’s proposal in a broader context. Many of the legislative efforts to curtail Black Lives Matter demonstrations parallel efforts made to criminalize nonviolent actions led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Clio and the Contemporary 