Anne Sarah Rubin
@annesarah.bsky.social
2.5K followers 1.7K following 87 posts
Historian of the American Civil War and the South, writing about food and famine. Maybe a mean girl Dissent is Patriotic Trans rights are human rights.
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“Nations reel and stagger on their way; they make hideous mistakes; they commit frightful wrongs; they do great and beautiful things. And shall we not best guide humanity by telling the truth about all this, so far as the truth is ascertainable?”
W.E.B. Du Bois
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin
Let me state this as clearly as I can:

It is not the job of a historian to make you feel good about your nation’s past.

We need to print this on t-shirts and bumper stickers.
a close up of a man 's face with his mouth open and a very angry look on his face .
ALT: a close up of a man 's face with his mouth open and a very angry look on his face .
media.tenor.com
Thank you @thetattooedprof.bsky.social for this important piece!! Those who push back against uncritical AI boosterism are not Luddites— and sometimes the Emporer does not have any clothes.
My latest column for the Chronicle of Higher Ed is now live. It's an argument for including AI-critical voices in campus conversations and policymaking workgroups, and I'm proud to get this dissenting piece into the mainstream genAI/higher ed discourse. Please read and share if you're so inclined 🙂
Advice | Sometimes We Resist AI for Good Reasons
Why higher ed needs to listen to the contrarians in setting policies on using tools like ChatGPT in faculty work.
www.chronicle.com
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin
ACLU @aclu.org · 24d
Jimmy Kimmel was taken off the air after our government threatened a private company with retaliation, marking a dark moment for free speech in our nation.

More than 400 artists across our nation signed on to say: We refuse to be silenced by those in power.
We the people must never accept government threats to our freedom of speech. Efforts by leaders to pressure artists, journalists, and companies with retaliation for their speech strike at the heart of what it means to live in a free country.

Last week, Jimmy Kimmel was taken off the air after the government threatened a private company with retaliation, marking a dark moment for freedom of speech in our nation. In an attempt to silence its critics, our government has resorted to threatening the livelihoods of journalists, talk show hosts, artists, creatives, and entertainers across the board. This runs counter to the values our nation was built upon, and our Constitution guarantees.

We know this moment is bigger than us and our industry. Teachers, government employees, law firms, researchers, universities, students and so many more are also facing direct attacks on their freedom of expression.

Regardless of our political affiliation, or whether we engage in politics or not, we all love our country. We also share the belief that our voices should never be silenced by those in power – because if it happens to one of us, it happens to all of us.

This is the moment to defend free speech across our nation. We encourage all Americans to join us, along with the ACLU, in the fight to defend and preserve our constitutionally protected rights. A graphic listing the names of the more than 400 signers of the ACLU's letter condemning the federal government's retaliation against Jimmy Kimmel. For the full list of signatories, visit aclu.org/kimmel-letter-bk
🗃️ Historians of the American Civil War and Reconstruction: There are still 2 weeks left to submit your 2025 books to the OAH Civil War and Reconstruction Book Award! www.oah.org/awards/book-...
OAH | Civil War and Reconstruction Book AwardOAH | Civil War and Reconstruction Book Award
www.oah.org
“Nations reel and stagger on their way; they make hideous mistakes; they commit frightful wrongs; they do great and beautiful things. And shall we not best guide humanity by telling the truth about all this, so far as the truth is ascertainable?”
W.E.B. Du Bois
They are not serious people. SMH
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin
DC statehood is now an imperative. No more dicking around. Next Dem majority, get it done immediately.
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin
IMPORTANT: “‘At many public universities, syllabi are considered intellectual property. As such, professors are not required to share their syllabi in response to public records requests. Check your university policy prior to complying advance.’"

www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty...
Conservative Org. Requests Materials for 70 Chapel Hill Courses
The Oversight Project, founded by the Heritage Foundation, is using an open records request to search for terms like “DEI” and “gender identity.” Faculty say it encroaches on academic freedom.
www.insidehighered.com
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin
“We wanted to rid ourselves of the fashions of historiography,” Burns summarized at one event, “and make a film that simply shows what happened.”

That’s not how history works though. You’re making an argument about what happened & what mattered even if you don’t realize you’re doing it. 🗃️
“whatever you write, you are taking a stance on your subject and on the practice of history itself. the suggestion that other historians are not also interested in ‘show[ing] what happened’ is, at best, careless.” www.politico.com/news/magazin...
What Ken Burns Won’t Say About the American Revolution
On the road with America’s foremost history documentarian in a fractured country.
www.politico.com
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin
A decent number of Union memes still have force and impact today, by virtue of the facts that: (1) our doughy seditionist Vice President loves him some Confederates; and (2) he goes by the very same initials as Jeff Davis
A stamp for envelopes during the Civil War. Features a heraldic shield of the Confederacy. In the middle,. white strip, an illustrator of the devil, sitting on a chest labeled "COTTON"  Below, the text "J. D., (his Crest.)"
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin
when oral exams go wrong
Trump: "The country had a great depression. And then after the depression, long after it started, they brought back tariffs to see if they could save it. But it took them really 25 years to get out of the great depression. A lot of people don't understand that."
Right on schedule
The academic’s mid-summer crisis is a mid-life crisis in miniature:

You realize summer is half gone, & not only that: you see that the longest & least burdened days came early, & they are well past. You compare all you thought you’d do against the days remaining & grieve for what never will be
"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, and that his justice may not sleep forever." This keeps rattling through my brain as a response to the tremendous cruelty and inhumanity of the current administration.
Reposted by Anne Sarah Rubin