History Commons^™

Never Mind Grendel! Can Beowulf Conquer The 21st-Century Guilt Trip?, Stephen Asma

Stephen T Asma

The writer casts doubt on whether the emasculated Beowulf put forward by J. R. R. Tolkien and in the recent movie version of the story transcends and nullifies the heroic original. He suggests that both Beowulfs may be necessary.

The Best-Laid Plans: Building On The Hill, Lynn E. Niedermeier

Lynn E. Niedermeier

Since WKU purchased its present campus in 1909, building on the Hill has reflected the visions--some realized, many unrealized--of its presidents and architects. The construction of Van Meter Hall, a water tower, a proposed memorial tower and a comprehensive 1930s campus plan attest to the trials and tribulations of making the Hill a beautiful and functional place.

Offensive Realism And Central & Eastern Europe After The Cold War, Dylan Kissane

Dylan Kissane

At the end of the Cold War, John Mearsheimer published the article, “Back to the Future: Instability in Europe after the Cold War”. The widely-cited piece included four predictions for the post-Cold War European geopolitical landscape founded on the theory of offensive realism, the realpolitik approach that Mearsheimer had established and developed over more than a decade of scholarship. However, the emergence of a post-Cold War and pan-continental peace suggests that something was wrong with Mearsheimer’s predictions and, by implication, the theory that informed them. This article argues that Mearsheimer’s mistake was to rely on a theory that assumed the …

Powerpoint At 20: Back To Basics, Robert Gaskins

Robert Gaskins

Let simplicity inspire, and resist the lure of unreadable fonts, stock clip art, sound effects, and flying bullet points.

Princípios-Tópicos De Hermenêutica Constitucional, Paulo Ferreira Da Cunha

Paulo Ferreira da Cunha

Houve tempo em que a Constituição servia para poisar ou charuto ou tirar um argumento político, como ironicamente afirmaria o grande escritor oitocentista Eça de Queiroz. Hoje a Constituição é a norma das normas. Daí há consequências hermenêuticas. Ao contrário das teorias que importam interpretação tradicional e, por vezes, em grande medida ultrapassada, para o Direito Constitucional, a tendência actual é a inversa: dada a supremacia da Constituição, deve ser a metodologia constitucional a exportar hermenêutica para o todo do Direito. Para isso, começamos neste artigo com grandes princípios de hermenêutica intra-constitucional. Depois se passará à exportação.

The Menace Of Security, Chandan Gowda

Chandan Gowda

No abstract provided.

‘Keep The “L” Out Of Los Angeles’: Race, Discourse, And Urban Modernity In 1920s Southern California, Jeremiah Axelrod

Jeremiah B.C. Axelrod

In the spring of 1926 the voters of Los Angeles were asked to decide whether to accept a modern rapid transit system for their metropolis. The referendum campaign, a watershed moment in American urban history, forced citizens to choose whether their rapidly growing city should develop into a centralized conurbation of skyscrapers linked by an extensive transit infrastructure, like New York and Chicago, or become a metropolis dominated by low-density development. Crucially, the campaign—charged with vivid rhetoric and metaphor, mobilized primarily by local newspapers—ultimately turned on Angelenos' conceptions of race and class and on their notions of what cosmopolitan urbanism …

States, Nations, And The Problem Of The Nation-State, Kevin Ostoyich

Kevin Ostoyich

No abstract provided.

Looking Up From The Gutter: Pop-Culture And Philosophy, Stephen Asma

Stephen T Asma

No abstract provided.

The Silent Revolution, Chandan Gowda

Chandan Gowda

No abstract provided.

The Admiralty Jurisdiction Of Torts And Crimes And The Failed Search For Its Purposes, Graydon S. Staring

Graydon S. Staring

This article views the jurisdiction, or power, of the Admiral in its historic setting as that of a governor, a ruler, of the offshore waters claimed by the kings. He had military, legislative (regulatory), police and judicial powers, the recognition of which became customary for maritime nations. The judicial jurisdiction comprised the legal questions that arose from his other functions. Like the rest of his powers, it was territorial rather than defined by other subject matter. This was the situation when the Constitution was adopted, when admiralty in its broadest form known to us was found in the colonies and …

The Challenges And Advantages Of Teaching Information Literacy Online, Diane M. Fulkerson

Diane M. Fulkerson

No abstract provided.

Community Feminism And Politics; A Case Study Of Santa Clara County As The Feminist Capital, 1975-2006, Danelle L. Moon

Danelle L. Moon

No abstract provided.

Iran, Nuclear Power And The Bomb, John Turner

John P. Turner

No abstract provided.

Invisible Enemies: The American War On Vietnam, 1975-2000, Edwin Martini

Edwin A. Martini

Beginning where most histories of the Vietnam War end, Invisible Enemies examines the relationship between the United States and Vietnam following the American pullout in 1975. Drawing on a broad range of sources, from White House documents and congressional hearings to comic books and feature films, Edwin Martini shows how the United States continued to wage war on Vietnam "by other means" for another twenty-five years. In addition to imposing an extensive program of economic sanctions, the United States opposed Vietnam's membership in the United Nations, supported the Cambodians, including the Khmer Rouge, in their decade-long war with the Vietnamese, …

Review Of German History From The Margins, Edited By Neil Gregor, Nils Roemer, And Mark Roseman,, Kevin Ostoyich

Kevin Ostoyich

No abstract provided.

Vea! Projecting Pornography, Mapping Modernity, And Acting Across The Sexual Frontier, Ageeth Sluis

Ageeth Sluis

No abstract provided.

Review Of Aus Feldpostbriefen Junger Christen 1939-1945: Ein Beitrag Zur Geschichte Der Katholischen Jugend Im Felde, Edited By Karl-Theodor Schleicher And Heinrich Walle, Kevin Ostoyich

Kevin Ostoyich

No abstract provided.

Resource Wars In Africa, Jesse Benjamin, Daniel Volman, Martin Murray

Jesse Benjamin

No abstract provided.

How England Got Its Name, (1014-1035), George Beech

George T. Beech

Distress During The Great Depression: The Illiquidity-Insolvency Debate Revisited, Gary Richardson

Gary Richardson

During the contraction from 1929 to 1933, the Federal Reserve System tracked changes in the status of all banks operating in the United States and determined the cause of each bank suspension. This essay analyzes chronological patterns in aggregate series constructed from that data. The analysis demonstrates both illiquidity and insolvency were substantial sources of bank distress. Periods of heightened distress were correlated with periods of increased illiquidity. Contagion via correspondent networks and bank runs propagated the initial banking panics. As the depression deepened and asset values declined, insolvency loomed as the principal threat to depository institutions.

Elizabethanne Boran And Crowford Gribben, Eds., Enforcing Reformation In Ireland And Scotland, 1550-1700, Michael Graham

Michael F. Graham

No abstract provided.

The Fall Of The 1977 Phillies: How A Baseball Team's Collapse Sank A City's Spirit, Mitchell J. Nathanson

Mitchell J Nathanson

Too often, the Philadelphia sports fan has been dismissed as a lout, a boorish dolt immune to reason, his vocabulary whittled down to a singular “boo.” This is particularly true when it comes to Phillies fans, who are more likely to turn on their team than any other in the city. Although the Eagles, Sixers and Flyers may hear it from the rafters when they’re not going well, only the Phils will hear it when they are. The strained relationship between the city and the Phillies, however, has deep historical and sociological roots; roots that directly correlate with the city’s …

Vea: Projecting Pornography In Mexico City, Transnational Bodies, And Acting Across The Sexual Frontier, Ageeth Sluis

Ageeth Sluis

This paper examines the articulation between the embodied city and changing gender norms in the wake of the Mexican Revolution, when the new state sought to reinvigorate and civilize Mexico City through urban reforms and public works. An analysis of the pornographic magazine Vea shows how views of "public women" were crucial to larger debates on gender and urbanization in Mexico City during the 1920s and 1930s. In the context of post World War I, a new, global ideal of the New Woman emerged through which women claimed both political and social mobility. Moreover, this ideology was articulated through a …

Recent Developments In American Religious History, Cynthia Taylor

Cynthia Taylor

The Mammoth Cave Party, Lynn E. Niedermeier

Lynn E. Niedermeier

In the early twentieth century, groups of students from the Western Kentucky State Normal School (now WKU) observed an annual tradition by embarking on field trips to Mammoth Cave. They fondly remembered their experiences hiking, camping, and touring the great natural wonder.

How To Survive The Apocalypse, Stephen Asma

Stephen T Asma

The article presents a guide on how people with skepticism and critical thinking can survive the Rapture and Armageddon. According to the Book of Revelations, the Lord will return to the earth to separate the good and the bad. When the Great Tribulation comes, people have no more time for repentance. The impostor strategy is one way to avoid the Tribulation.

Deposit Insurance And Moral Hazard: Capital, Risk, Malfeasance, And Mismanagement. A Comment On ‘Deposit Insurance And Moral Hazard: Evidence From Texas Banking During The 1920s, Gary Richardson

Gary Richardson

A Journal of Economic History article by Linda Hooks and Kenneth Robinson, “Deposit Insurance and Moral Hazard: Evidence from Texas Banking During the 1920s,” contains a contradiction (Hooks and Robinson 2002). Pondering the contradiction in the paper reveals insights that the authors may have overlooked. Hooks and Robinson’s article examines the experience of the banking industry in Texas during the 1920s. Texas operated a deposit-insurance system from January 1, 1910 until February 11, 1927. Deposit insurance was mandatory for all state banks, which were given the choice of two plans in which to participate. The preponderance participated in the depositors …

Check Is In The Mail: Correspondent Clearing And The Banking Panics Of The Great Depression, Gary Richardson

Gary Richardson

Weaknesses within the check-clearing system played a hitherto unrecognized role in the banking crises of the Great Depression. Correspondent check-clearing networks were vulnerable to counter-party cascades. Accounting conventions that overstated reserves available to corresponding institutions may have exacerbated the situation. The initial banking panic began when a correspondent network centered in Nashville collapsed, forcing over 100 institutions to suspend operations. As the contraction continued, additional correspondent systems imploded. The vulnerability of correspondent networks is one reason that banks that cleared via correspondents failed at higher rates than other institutions during the Great Depression.

Mainstreaming And Integrating The Substance And Spectacle Of Scholar-Baller: A New Game Plan For The Ncaa, Higher Education And Society, Keith Harrison

Dr. C. Keith Harrison

The purpose of this chapter is to theoretically and empirically capture the cultural divide between education and sport and entertainment in American society. The NCAA Academic Reform Movement has evolved from holding individuals accountable to presently monitoring institutions and their retention and graduation success of college student athletes. This movement will require a deeper examination of how culture influences academic attitudes and lifelong learning. Based on empirical data from different methodologies, this chapter proposes that student athletes; especially African American males, are often stereotyped with few strategies to empower their academic and athletic identities. The Scholar-Baller Paradigm is designed to …