Uncommon Sense
TJ takes on Buffon
By Gordon M. Sayre, author of “Jefferson Takes on Buffon: The Polemic on American Animals in Notes on the State of Virginia” in the January 2021 issue of the William and Mary Quarterly Thomas Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia has intrigued me for my entire career. In my dissertation research I read… Read More
Science for the History of Science: An Imperfect Tool
By Whitney Barlow Robles If given the option to expand my already-lengthy article, “The Rattlesnake and the Hibernaculum,” which appeared in the January 2021 William & Mary Quarterly—well, I would probably decline for fear of losing my reader in its serpentine folds. If forced to expand my essay, on the other hand, I would have… Read More
Updates from the WMQ
By Joshua Piker, Editor It will likely come as no surprise to learn that I spend way too much time worrying about authorial voice. For an editor, that’s very on-brand. I only raise the issue because I’ve been worrying, in particular, about my authorial voice on this blog. I’ve got two go-to voices for blog posts, neither of which… Read More
What's New in This New Year
How the OI Plans to Support You in 2021, Vast Early America By Karin Wulf Welcome to 2021, a year like every other in which we know that the early American past we learn, listen, read, research, speak, teach, view, and write will be incredibly important. And yet, like the year that’s just ended, that importance seems turbo-charged for… Read More
Defining the project
By Hannah Farber When I help graduate students prepare applications for fellowships and jobs, we sometimes talk about the phrase “my project.” What does this phrase actually mean? Ph. D. students usually use it, reflexively, to mean “my dissertation.” Book writers often use it to mean “my book.” I prefer to think about a “project” as a bundle of… Read More
An argument over seven years in the making
By Asheesh Siddique In 2013, while I was a PhD candidate making my first foray into research on a dissertation about administrative knowledge practices in the early modern British empire, I stumbled across a curious and cryptic set of notes in an obscure file at the UK National Archives at Kew Gardens. The file, TNA, CO 318/2, is ambiguously… Read More
Not Your Typical Book Talks
by Catherine E. Kelly This week, we will launch the first of three online OI Author Conversations scheduled for the current academic year. Featuring scholars whose books are forthcoming or recently published, this series will open up the research, writing, and thinking that go into making a polished product. Unlike even the best book talks, which tend to summarize… Read More
Flexibility is our future
by Karin Wulf This week I learned, via a paper my son is writing, that the molecules in rubber are polymers, meaning that they are shaped like a chain. In a resting state those molecules bunch up in a chaotic tangle, but, when you stretch them, like when you stretch a rubber band, the chains sort themselves into clean… Read More
Elections in Early America Podcast Series Releases TODAY!
Every year, the United States holds elections. Often these elections are for city, town, and state offices. Every two years, the United States holds federal elections, where the American people elect those who will represent and serve them in their national government. How did elections in the United States develop? Who is American democracy for and who gets to… Read More
Reading on Elections in Vast Early America
Want to learn more about elections and voting in early America? We’ve compiled a list of suggested books, articles, and online resources that you might find helpful. We either used these works ourselves for production research or they were suggested by our guests. Happy researching! Books Richard R. Beeman, The Varieties of Political Experience in Eighteenth-Century America Christopher M. Read More