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Ben Waterhouse

@benwaterhouse.bsky.social

610 followers 230 following 330 posts

Historian @UNC-Chapel Hill. Works on culture and politics of business, especially in modern U.S. Newest book: One Day I'll Work for Myself: The Dream and Delusion that Conquered America

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · 6h

"A business student can [read a book in a library] to explain supply chain optimization or [hire someone to] generate market analysis in seconds. The traditional lecture-and-test model faces its [Gutenberg] moment."

There, fixed it.

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · 25d

The Presidential Records Act found its way into a toilet in Mar a Lago a LONG time ago...

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · 29d

Professor Popper has entered the chat!

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · 29d

yeah that tracks

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · 29d

Which tall mean Irish Catholic guy did you have for 8th grade Social Studies? The bald one or the other one?

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 16

"Racists who like to smoke weed."

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 11

Gonna break their hearts when you get to Scopes...

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 10

This article is insipid and stupid, but the sub-head is worse. No one is "too young" to "fact check" things that happened before they can remember.

Maybe too lazy or ignorant, but not too young.

Entire professions exist to explain things you didn't live through.

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/09/s...

Remember When Things Were Better in the ’90s? A.I. Does Too.

www.nytimes.com

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 10

I don't think people should be getting MBAs, but I would point out that there is nothing mutually exclusive about being a history major and going to business school.

Gregory A. Hargreaves 🎃 @bordergroves.bsky.social · Sep 9

History majors have lower unemployment than computer science majors.

Folks with humanities graduate degrees are more sought after by corporate recruiters than those with MBAs.

Study history! Get a job!

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 10

But did he catch the Mario Savio reference?

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 4

Matt LeBlanc, best known as that guy in that ketchup commercial that one time

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 4

Ben Affleck, best known as that little kid on Voyage of the Mimi

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 2

I know this isn't the point, but there is no way that speech was written in the present century. Leaving aside the reprehensible views, the language itself is completely plagiarized from some early 20th century bullshitter.

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 2

I mean, Jason was just a wee pup then, so kudos to him for the article!

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 2

I too think of 1998 as "a little more than a decade" ago. Solidarity.

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 2

Reviews in American History, June 2021. Subtitle is "how I learned to quit worrying and love the decade," so that's the angle. If that's not it, his citations might contain what you're looking for.

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Sep 2

Are you thinking of Bruce Schulman's Islands in Time?

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 26

Yeah, oral exams don't scale!

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 26

Yeah, that's brutal. I guess the question is what the trade-off is. I understood the article to propose in-class written tests instead of take-home essays. If you did bluebooks, what would you swap them for?

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 26

We mix it up. When TAs do it, I provide a very clear prompt/rubric.

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 26

I've found ways to do in-class, on-paper exams for large first-year classes. It can be weird, but it can be done. I find asking shorter, more pointed, and more numerous questions works better and is more straightforward to grade (rather than 5-paragraph essays)

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 20

I lectured college students today about why Jefferson called farmers "the chosen people of God."

I said it was like what a certain 90s movie said about stuff "from the earth... God put this here for me and you."

Pretty sure no one caught the reference.

Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 15

This conversation brought to you by Statler and Waldorf.

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 14

It's a profound antidote to the "everyone is a winner" mentality that has overtaken childhood. Telling kids "the people in the Hall of Fame fail 65% of the time" is an important lesson.

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Ben Waterhouse @benwaterhouse.bsky.social · Aug 13

Favorite US history myth that needs to die a sudden and quick death, GO:

"Small business is the backbone of the economy."

Rebecca Fachner @rebeccafachner.bsky.social · Aug 13

Favorite US history myth that needs to die a sudden and quick death, GO:

I’ll start
Betsy Ross didn’t sew the first fucking flag.
There was no ‘first’ flag.
Her name wasn’t Betsy Ross

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