The Ohio Seminar in Early American History and Culture, 2010

The Ohio Seminar in Early American History and Culture will meet three times in the Winter quarter, 2010. This year the Seminar will be co-sponsored by the OSU History Working Group in Power, Culture, and the State. Thus we welcome all faculty and graduate students with an interest in early American studies, and also in the broader interest in wider comparative topics that this working group is developing. Graduate students in Early American History are strongly urged to attend.

The papers will be available in printable PDF format here on the Ohio Seminar Web site about two weeks prior to each meeting - follow the prompt below to access the papers. This page is password protected: please contact John Brooke for access. A limited number of copies of the papers will be available at the department front desk in Dulles Hall.

We would like to invite the Ohio Seminar membership to attend the meetings of the department's Center for Historical Research. The center's two-year program is currently "The Intersection of Diaspora, Immigration and Gender in World." The CHR will not meet this winter, but will have a series of presentations on in the Spring Quarter. For further information ands contacts, please consult the Center's Program Web site at: http://chr.osu.edu

January 29:
Ronald P. Formisano,
William T. Bryan Chair of American History
University of Kentucky

American Political History, Parties and Populism: Retrospect and Prospect

February 12:
Nicholas Guyatt
University of York, UK
Stanford University, 2009-2010

America’s Conservatory: Race, Reconstruction and the Santo Domingo debate.

Abstract:

My paper explores the strange and ultimately abortive American effort to annex the Dominican Republic in the aftermath of the Civil War. The episode has usually been regarded as a shabby piece of corruption -- a 'job' to rank alongside the Grant administration's other scandals -- or as a precursor to America's imperial adventures later in the century. But my paper frames the debate as actually a crucial chapter in the story of Reconstruction and in the effort to determine the place of black people in the restored United States. I'm especially interested in the emphasis placed by Grant and Republicans on absorbing the Dominican Republic as a state or territory (rather than a protectorate or a colony), and in the politics of absorbing a non-white territory in the context of the citizenship battles of the Reconstruction era. 

The paper is a first-run at the conclusion of the book I'm currently working on, which is tentatively entitled The Scale of Beings and the Prehistory of Separate but Equal. The book examines the connections between ideas of racial equality and programs for racial separation in the early republic. If anyone has the time/is interested in the topic, I develop this theme a bit more in a recent article: '"The Outskirts of our Happiness:" Race and the Lure of Colonization in the Early Republic,' Journal of American History 95 (2009), 986-1011.

February 26:
Jessica C. Roney, Ohio University

"The Original Community Organizers: Colonial Philadelphia Volunteers and the Delineation of Civic Space, 1725-1775"

Abstract:

Historians have long understood voluntary associations to be a vital part of the civic life of the United States from its earliest years to the present. Less studied is the role that voluntary associations played in colonial America, despite evidence of a vibrant culture of civic and social  clubs. Philadelphians, for example, formed over sixty formal associations before 1775, and by the eve of Revolution, one in five adult white men participated in at least one.  Their participation shaped their own lives and the texture of political, economic, and social life in British America's largest city.  This paper examines the Philadelphia men who formed fire companies, debated scientific questions, took over poor relief, hunted foxes, created extra-legal militias, and through it all tippled generously. At root, who were these men?  This paper explores the social  geography mapped through Philadelphians' club memberships to look at inclusivity and exclusivity in social and civic life; as well as the effect that participation had on individuals and on larger patterns of community and political process.

• Campus Map & Dulles Hall

• Follow this link for PDF copies of the papers (available two weeks prior to each meeting) | request password

• Seminars Presented in Previous Years

The seminar meets 168 Dulles Hall, 230 W. 17th Ave., Ohio State University, Columbus Campus, 4:00-5:45.  Papers will be posted on the seminar Web site roughly two weeks prior to the seminar meeting, with a detailed announcement following.  We will continue our tradition of a "Dutch-treat" dinner following the seminar, open to all, at a restaurant of the presenter's choosing!!   Further details will be distributed prior to each seminar.  Anyone with questions regarding these sessions should contact John Brooke: brooke.10@osu.edu

Steering committee:
John Brooke, Ohio State University
Margaret Newell, Ohio State University
Drew Cayton, Miami University
Carla Pestana, Miami University
Mitchell Snay, Denison College