Karin Wulf

@kawulf.bsky.social

13K followers 2.6K following 11K posts

Historian of #VastEarlyAmerica, gender, family & politics | Director & Librarian @ JCBLibrary | History Prof @ Brown U

#LineageTheBook OUP July, 2025 | On some other platforms and also @ karinwulf.com | Opinions here just mine. .. more

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Karin A. Wulf is an American historian and the Beatrice and Julio Mario Santo Domingo Director and Librarian of the John Carter Brown Library in Providence, Rhode Island. She was the executive director of the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia from 2013 through 2021. She is also one of the founders of Women Also Know History, a searchable website database of women historians. Additionally, Wulf worked to spearhead a neurodiversity working group at William & Mary in 2011. She is currently writing a book about genealogy and political culture in Early America titled, Lineage: Genealogy and the Politics of Connection in British America, 1680-1820. Her work examines the history of women, gender, and the family in Early America. .. more

Political science 42%

Sociology 16%

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Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · Dec 28

It’s been a long time coming… so thrilled to share the cover (and Oxford UP website last in 🧵) for my book, _Lineage: Genealogy and the Power of Connection in Early America_, pub date 7.2.25 (but will ship, so they say very enticingly, mid-June. 1/ #VastEarlyAmerica 🗃️

Book cover with various kinds of evidence of family history arrayed around the author and title, the latter is _Lineage: Genealogy and the Power of Connection in Early America_. The kinds of materials include printed texts, manuscripts, a red book (shhhhh that figures largely in the Introduction!), a watercolor family record, Fraktur, gravestone, and a sampler. One repeated text says "born free, born free (etc)"

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 1d

So tough bc recently both have had such relatively mild treatment!

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 1d

There is nothing about Henry that is sympathetic but crikey the hellish people around him occasionally make him look slightly less horrid.

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 1d

The BEST. Both of my kids have asked me for the same and I really wondered if I’d ever felt more needed as a parent. 😄🤓

Reposted by Manisha Sinha

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 1d

Re-reading a lot more about Henry VIII lately. Murderous narcissist made vastly worse by sycophants and opportunist bureaucrats.

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 1d

At one point in I would just open the proof to any page and see how many errors I could spot! The page by page is so numbing. But it'll be done soon, and out in the world, and into the hands of appreciative readers.

Reposted by Caroline T. Schroeder, Karin Wulf

Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 2d

Let’s say you had the opportunity to assign college students *1* thing (article, video, podcast) to help them understand what edtech is, how it’s funded, who benefits from it, and how it preys on their data. What hits these bases in a comprehensive, up-to-date, and powerful way?

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 2d

There is also an angle here about manuscripts dealers... 🥸

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 2d

Fantastic, thank you!

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 2d

When I say that the bastards are getting me down, what I mean is I submitted a revised essay abt the family histories that single moms spoke into the late 18thc court record on behalf of their babies. And how those histories are occluded not by shaming rituals but records practices then and since.

Screenshot for the first paragraph of an essay "'Saith she is with child": Family Histories in the Fornication Archive."

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 2d

Indeed.

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 2d

For anyone reading with even a little background, this article tells us a bit more about what's happening at the National Archives: www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/a...

At the National Archives, a Deep Dive Into the American Story

www.nytimes.com

Reposted by Trevon D. Logan, Karin Wulf

KEW @kidadaewilliams.com · 2d

America stares down erasure of Black history and progress www.axios.com/2025/11/29/f... "The cuts and deletions are, paradoxically, drawing more attention to Black history [and the need for it to understand and respond to this moment], says National Urban League president Marc H. Morial."

America stares down erasure of Black history and progress

In the last year, federal, state and institutional decisions have gutted pillars of America's civil rights protections.

www.axios.com

Reposted by Karin Wulf

Ted McCormick @tedmccormick.bsky.social · 3d

discussed this in seminar yesterday, albeit with reference to “race science” generally. If you understand science as a historical phenomenon then the question is what was science then, not whether it would count as science now, and the implication is that what science is now is not forever, either

Jacqueline Antonovich @jackiantonovich.bsky.social · 3d

1. Historically, eugenics was not a pseudoscience. It was *science* Almost every scientist, social scientist, academic, etc. believed in the validity of eugenics. You would have to search far & wide to find a scientist that didn't believe in some form of it. They taught it in college!

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 3d

This evening! 😃🤓

Karin Wulf @kawulf.bsky.social · 4d

Some of the most meaningful materials I worked with for _Lineage_, conveying the infrastructural role of genealogy & the power of family, is at the American Antiquarian Society.

Excited to be there tomorrow night (& online) to talk abt the book! Info ⬇️
www.americanantiquarian.org/programs-eve...