In an era of "don't say gay" laws, Dr. Pippa Holloway, chair of the University of Richmond's Department of History, believes in the relevance and importance of teaching LGBT history to students for what they learn about courts, the Constitution, civil rights, and America as a whole.
Monday, November 17th | 5:30-6:30pm | Brown Alley Room
In 1775, hundreds and possibly thousands of enslaved Americans fled their patriot owners for British lines in a risky gamble for freedom. Impressed by their bravery, Lord Dunmore--the last royal governor of Virginia--emancipated those in bondage in November. He formed the first Black unit in the British empire and sent them into battle against the patriots. What were the impacts of these events on the unfolding war between Britain and the colonies, and on the subsequent conflict over slavery in the young United States? Come hear a lecture that challenges many of our conventional assumptions about the founding of our nation.
This lecture will be given by Andrew Lawler, a journalist and author who has written about history, science, religion, and politics from dozens of countries. He is author of four books, and his byline has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, National Geographic, Smithsonian, and many other publications. Andrew is a contributing writer for Science and contributing editor for Archaeology, as well as a National Geographic Explorer and a Pulitzer Center grantee. His work has won a number of journalism awards, and appeared several times in The Best of Science and Nature Writing.
Andrew’s newest book, A Perfect Frenzy: A Royal Governor, His Black Allies, and the Crisis That Spurred the American Revolution, will be available for purchase after the lecture.
In 2015, members of the LGBTQ+ community rejoiced when the Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution protected the right of same-sex couples to marry. Many of the celebrants on the court steps held signs that read "Love Is Love," which reflected the movement’s argument that marriage rights were meant to respect and support the emotional bonds between devoted partners. But although the campaign for marriage equality was about love, it was also about money. Same-sex couples’ inability to marry imposed significant financial harms on queer households. This lecture highlights the overlooked fights for economic equality that predated the movement for marriage rights, revealing how these battles ultimately helped produce the Supreme Court’s historic decision recognizing same-sex marriage.
What happens to a community that experiences political factionalization, religious fervor, and racial anxiety and starts to look for an enemy within? These three factors and more culminated in the Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692 when a group of young girls started to suffer afflictions and parents understood that the threat of Satan arrived in their Puritan community. In this talk, Dr. Dan Howlett, Adjunct Lecturer of History, tells his family history about the scapegoating and violence committed in 17th century Massachusetts. Between nine and eleven generations ago, one of his great-grandfathers diagnosed the witchcraft afflictions while others defended Rebecca Nurse from accusations, one cousin accused over 80 people while another relative fled after her conviction. This talk will cover what happened and why neighbor turned against neighbor and why we still need to care about this story in 2025.
Jesse Helms (1921-2008) dominated the political landscape of North Carolina during the last half of the twentieth century. Though Helms’s more than thirty years in the US Senate are most remembered for what he opposed rather than what he achieved, he was a central figure in modern conservativism. Helms innovated strategies for consolidating political power by using broadcast media to generate grassroots outrage. In addition, Helms’s National Congressional Club successfully raised a powerful warchest that could be used in television attack ads. Anticipating the rise of MAGA, Helms’s career-long penchant for race-baiting and homophobic rhetoric created many opponents, but even they acknowledged his uncanny ability to piece together slender electoral majorities in a rapidly changing nation.
This lecture will be given by the 2025-2026 Visiting Cornerstones Chair in History, Bill Link.
Michelle Kahn, associate professor of history, won the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians Book Prize for her book Foreign in Two Homelands: Racism, Return Migration, and Turkish-German History.
David Brandenberger, professor of history and global studies, published Stalin’s Usable Past, which analyzes Stalin’s role in rewriting Soviet history to emphasize a thousand-year legacy before the 1917 Revolution and reshape Soviet identity.
David Brandenberger, professor of history and global studies, published “‘Basically, it’s a History of the Russian State’: Russocentrism, Etatism, and the Ukrainian Question in Stalin’s Editing of the 1937 Short History of the USSR” in Nationalities Papers.
David Brandenberger, professor of history and global studies, presented “The Foundations of Russian Statehood: An Analysis of the New ‘Civilizationism’ Curriculum in Russia’s Higher Educational Institutions” at a conference hosted by the Polish Academy of Sciences’ Institute of History. The paper analyzes a new mandatory civics course taught today in all Russian colleges and universities.
History professor Eric Yellin is quoted.
Historian and president emeritus Edward Ayers is quoted.
History professor Michelle Lynn Kahn is interviewed.
History professor Eric Yellin is quoted.
Mailing address:
History Department
Humanities Building
106 UR Drive
University of Richmond, VA 23173
Phone: (804) 287-6041
Fax: (804) 287-1992
Department Chair: Dr. Pippa Holloway
Academic Administrative Coordinator: Catherine Hash