Southern Baptist Theological Seminary church historian John Wilsey recently took a shot at Kristin Kobes Du Mez’s Jesus and John Wayne in a review published at a conservative website called Ad Fontes. Though Wilsey shows much more empathy than some...
gender history
A critique of “Jesus and John Wayne”
If social media is any indication, everyone loves Kristin Kobes Du Mez’s book Jesus and John Wayne. The praise is merited. It’s a strong book that says things about the recent history of American evangelicalism that should have been said...
When Canadian Methodists erased women evangelists from their history
Check out historian Scott McLaren‘s interesting piece at Borealia, a blog about early Canadian history. McLaren, the author of Pulpit, Press, and Politics: Methodists and the Market for Books in Upper Canada, explores the ways early Methodist historians erased “the...
The Author’s Corner with Jessica Marie Johnson
Jessica Marie Johnson is Assistant Professor of History at Johns Hopkins University. This interview is based on her new book, Wicked Flesh: Black Women, Intimacy, and Freedom in the Atlantic World (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2020). JF: What led you to write Wicked...
The Author’s Corner with Allison Fredette
Allison Fredette is Assistant Professor of History at Appalachian State University. This interview is based on her new book, Marriage on the Border: Love, Mutuality, and Divorce in the Upper South during the Civil War (The University Press of Kentucky, 2020)....
Pro-Trump Evangelical: “When you look at the women who were literally scratching the doors of the Supreme Court building and pounding the doors, it was like someone having a tantrum when they couldn’t get their way…”
Michael Brown, a pro-Trump radio pundit, recently appeared on court evangelical Steven Strang‘s podcast and talked about the attempts to impeach Donald Trump . The title of the podcast is “Are Demonic Spirits Influencing the Trump Impeachment Process.” (I am...
Kate Bowler on Evangelical Women Celebrities
Duke Divinity School’s Kate Bowler keeps churning out books. Her latest is The Preacher’s Wife: The Precarious Power of Evangelical Women Celebrities. Over at Christianity Today, Liberty University’s Karen Swallow Prior interviews Bowler about her new book. Here is a taste: Despite...
The Author’s Corner With Kelly Ryan
Kelly A. Ryan is Dean of the School of Social Sciences and Professor of History at Indiana University-Southeast. This interview is based on her new book Everyday Crimes: Social Violence and Civil Rights in Early America (New York University Press, 2019). JF:...
Did Men Invent “Likability?”
Check out historian Claire Potter‘s piece at The New York Times: “Men Invented ‘Likability.’ Guess Who Benefits.” She reflects on the origins of the idea of “likability” advertising culture and, eventually presidential politics. As Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar and...
The Author’s Corner with James Broomall
James Broomall is Director of the George Tyler Moore Center for the Study of the Civil War and Assistant Professor of History at Shepherd University. This interview is based on his new book, Private Confederacies: The Emotional Worlds of Southern...
Billy Sunday
I used to have a friend who occasionally wore a t-shirt with a picture of Billy Sunday and the caption “Evangelical with an Attitude.” (Hi Fred!). I thought about my friend and his shirt when I read Liva Gerson’s latest...
Gender History at #AHA19
Over at Perspectives on History, Colgate University historian Monica Mercado “takes stock” of gender history at this weekend’s annual meeting of the American Historical Association. Here is a taste: More than 30 years after Joan Scott first argued for gender as...
Male Authoritarianism and the Southern Baptists
R. Marie Griffith directs the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics at Washington University in St. Louis. Some of you may remember our interview with her in Episode 32 of The Way of Improvement Leads Home Podcast. During...
Author’s Corner with Leigh Fought
Leigh Fought is Associate Professor of History at LeMoyne College. This interview is based on her book Southern Womanhood and Slavery: A Biography of Louisia S. McCord, due out in paperback in September 2018 with University of Missouri Press. JF: What...
Author’s Corner with Elisabeth Ceppi
Elisabeth Ceppi is Associate Professor of English at Portland State University. This interview is based on her new book Invisible Masters: Gender, Race, and the Economy of Service in Early New England (Dartmouth University Press, 2018). JF: What led you to write Invisible...
Mary Beth Norton on Women in Academe
Norton is the president of the American Historical Association and Mary Donlon Alger Professor of American History at Cornell University. She reflects on her experience as a woman in the academy in a Chronicle of Higher Education article titled “The Awakening: Women...
The Author’s Corner with Amanda Izzo
Amanda Izzo is an assistant professor in the Department of Women’s and Gender Studies at Saint Louis University. This interview is based on her new book, Liberal Christianity and Women’s Global Activism: The YWCA of the USA and the Maryknoll Sisters (Rutgers...
Mary Beth Norton Was the First Historian to Use the Word “Gender” in *The William and Mary Quarterly*
The phrase “African American” was not used in the WMQ until 1999. Check out Michael McDonnell‘s piece at Panorama on the William and Mary Quarterly‘s searchable index. For those of you unfamiliar with the William and Mary Quarterly, it is the premier journal of...
The Author’s Corner with Ashley Baggett
Ashley Baggett is assistant professor of History, Philosophy, and Religious Studies at North Dakota State University. This interview is based on her new book, Intimate Partner Violence in New Orleans: Gender, Race, and Reform, 1840-1900 (University Press of Mississippi, 2017). JF: What led...
What Happens When You Teach a Graduate Seminar on “Women, Gender, and Sex in U.S. Religious History” to a Class That is Over 85% Men?
Andrea Turpin, a history professor at Baylor University, reflects on such an experience in a recent post at The Anxious Bench. She uses her observations from this graduate seminar, as well as her experience teaching an undergraduate class on women...