Five years ago
this week, I launched
this blog. There’s plenty I could say about those five years and how the
blog has developed, changed, and (I hope and believe) improved immeasurably
over that time, as well as all it has meant to my scholarly writing and work,
career, teaching, relationships, and life. But rather than indulge in quite
that much navel-gazing, I wanted to use this anniversary to highlight instead
five other blogs that have been influential and inspiring to me along the way.
Some are more presently active than others, and all have been featured in this
space before; but they’re all well worth your time in any case, and it’s a
pleasure to highlight them once again.
1)
The American Literary Blog: Despite
its somewhat more specific focus, Rob
Velella’s blog on 19th century American literature remains the
closest parallel to my own blog that I’ve found. And much more importantly,
every post is a combination of fun, informative, surprising, and engaging. A
model for me to this day!
2)
Civil War
Memory: I don’t imagine there are many AmericanStudiers who haven’t checked
out Kevin Levin’s longstanding and
award-winning blog by now. But if you haven’t, you certainly should! Kevin
combines responses to current events, historical scholarship, and engagement
with his peers and colleagues as well as any writer I know, and in all those
and other ways continues to inspire my own work.
3)
Deep
Down in the Classroom: Run by my former Temple University grad colleague Jessica
Restaino and her colleagues at the Montclair
University First Year Writing Program, Deep Down represents the best kind
of pedagogical blog: practical yet philosophical, evolving yet grounded, helpful
yet challenging. I’ve tried to include my teaching more and more in this space
as it has grown, and it’s pedagogical blogs like Deep Down that have helped
guide the way.
4)
Race Files:
I’ve written quite a bit in this space about my gradual move into public
scholarship, and indeed no space has been more important in that evolution than
this blog. As I’ve tried to engage more and more overtly here with current
events and public debates, without losing the curiosity and openness and analytical
engagement that I hope have been part of this blog all along, successful and
multi-faceted public scholarly blogs like Race Files have been hugely inspiring
to me.
5)
Ta-Nehisi Coates:
In the five years I’ve been writing this blog, Coates has gone from a
journalist and blogger with a small but rabid following (this AmericanStudier included)
to one of the most famous
writers in America. But when I read his second book, Between
the World and Me, it still felt very much like I was reading his blog. That’s
about the highest praise I can give the book, and is a style for which I strive
in my own current and future book projects as well. I’ll get there, with the
help of these and many other inspiring writers and blogs!
Next series
starts Monday,
Ben
PS. I’ve asked
it before but will ask it again: I’d really love for you to say hi (in comments
or by email) and, if you’d
like, let me know a bit about what brought you to the blog, what you’d like to
see here, and what your own AmericanStudies interests are. Gracias!
No comments:
Post a Comment