FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW YORK, NY (JUNE 9, 2006) – From June 12 through June 20, nineteen professors representing sixteen community colleges across Virginia will attend a seminar called Recent Scholarship in American History, at the University of Virginia and Monticello. The seminar, sponsored by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and the Virginia Community College System and organized in partnership with the University of Virginia and the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, will be led by Carol Berkin, Professor of History at Baruch College and City University of New York Graduate Center. The idea for creating the seminar came from Gilder Lehrman Institute advisory board members Edward L. Ayers, Dean of the College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences at the University of Virginia; and Daniel P. Jordan, President of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation.

“Community college history professors often represent a student's critically important first - and sometimes last - college level encounter with American history,” said Lesley S. Herrmann, Executive Director of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. “Yet these teachers often have little time to keep current with the latest scholarship in the field or to discuss new interpretations or methodologies with their peers.”

“Virginia Community College teachers of American history are masters of the craft of the survey course, yet often have little chance for reflection and discussion on scholarship that revises and refines what they teach,” said Cliff Haury, Professor of History and Dean of Humanities, Fine Arts and Social Sciences at Piedmont Virginia Community College.

“All of us who teach history need to engage new ideas and test the durability of our older understandings,” said Berkin. “New scholarship challenges old certainties, offers unexpected insights, and opens up new avenues for discussion with our colleagues and our students. It is important to read recent scholarship, but it is equally important to have a setting in which we can debate the merits of these works with our peers.”
The seminar will focus on four recent books, each selected in an effort to look at familiar survey course topics in a new way:

• Carol Berkin's, Revolutionary Mothers: Women in the Struggle for America’s Independence demonstrates how attention to gender can revise teachers’ understanding of the American Revolution as a home front war.
  


• Joanne Freeman's Affairs of Honor: National Politics in the New Republic shows how careful attention to political culture provides new insights into the political conflicts of the early national period. Freeman is Professor of History and Director of Graduate Studies, Yale University.



• Peter Bernstein's Wedding of the Waters: The Erie Canal and the Making of a Great Nation illustrates the connection between technology and the emergence of a market economy in the antebellum years. Bernstein is a best-selling author and economic consultant.



• Ira Berlin's Generations of Captivity: A History of African-American Slaves reconstructs the regional differences and changes over time that produced many variations of slavery in America. Berlin is Distinguished University Professor, University of Maryland.

In addition to sessions led by Berkin, Freeman, Berlin, and Ayers, participants will study with Theodore J. Crackel, Professor and Editor in Chief, Papers of George Washington, University of Virginia; Holly Cowan Shulman, Research Professor, Editor, Dolley Madison Digital Edition, University of Virginia; Susan Purdue, Associate Editor, Jefferson Library, Monticello; and Brian P. Murphy, Gilder Dissertation Fellow.

Community colleges represented are: Blue Ridge Community College in Weyers Cave, VA; Central Virginia Community College in Lynchburg, VA; Germanna Community College in Fredericksburg, VA; John Tyler Community College in Chester, VA; J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College in Richmond, VA; New River Community College in Dublin, VA; Northern Virginia Community College, Annandale Campus in Annandale, VA; Northern Virginia Community College, Loudoun Campus in Sterling, VA; Paul D. Camp Community College in Suffolk, VA; Piedmont Virginia Community College in Charlottesville, VA; Rappahannock Community College in Warsaw, VA; Southwest Virginia Community College in Richlands, VA; Thomas Nelson Community College in Hampton, VA; Tidewater Community College-Portsmouth Campus in Portsmouth, VA; Tidewater Community College-Virginia Beach Campus in Virginia Beach, VA; Virginia Highlands Community College in Abingdon, VA.
Seminar participants are:

Willis Betts
Rappahannock Community College
Warsaw, VA
Germanna Community College
Fredericksburg, VA

Randolph Boothe-Pharr
Paul D. Camp Community College
Suffolk, VA

Sara Combs
Virginia Highlands Community College
Abingdon, VA

Johnette Hill
Tidewater Community College-Virginia Beach Campus
Virginia Beach, VA

Ellen Johnson
Northern Virginia Community College, Annandale Campus
Annandale, VA

Leonard Lewane
Blue Ridge Community College
Weyers Cave, VA

David McGee
Central Virginia Community College
Lynchburg, VA

John Paden
Rappahannock Community College
Warsaw, VA

William Paquette
Tidewater Community College-Portsmouth Campus
Portsmouth, VA

Rolande Phillips
Thomas Nelson Community College
Hampton, VA

Samuel Pincus
Piedmont Virginia Community College
Charlottesville, VA

Richard Poteat
Central Virginia Community College
Lynchburg, VA

Carolyn Quenstedt
John Tyler Community College
Chester, VA
J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College
Richmond, VA

Patrick Reed
Northern Virginia Community College, Loudoun Campus
Sterling, VA

Frederick Schmidt
Piedmont Virginia Community College
Charlottesville, VA

Henry Thill
Piedmont Virginia Community College
Charlottesville, VA

Joseph Windham
Northern Virginia Community College, Alexandria Campus
Alexandria, VA

Brian Wright
Southwest Virginia Community College
Richlands, VA

Robert Young
New River Community College
Dublin, VA

Founded in 1994, the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History promotes the study and love of American history. Increasingly national and international in scope, the Institute targets audiences ranging from students to scholars to the general public. It creates history-centered schools and academic research centers, organizes seminars and enrichment programs for educators, partners with school districts to implement Teaching American History grants, produces print and electronic publications and traveling exhibitions, and sponsors lectures by eminent historians. The Institute also funds awards including the Lincoln, Frederick Douglass and George Washington Book Prizes and offers fellowships for scholars to work in history archives, including the Gilder Lehrman Collection.


###

The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History
19 West 44th Street, Suite 500
New York, NY 10036
www.gilderlehrman.org