Scott Sandage
@scottsandage.bsky.social
History isn’t reality, it’s methodology.
Historian. Husband. Iowan. Pittsburgh 🏳️🌈🐕🪕⚾️ Wrote a book long ago. Writing another on the Métis Rez in Nebraska. Most useful thing I’ve done is probably https://commonplace.online/article/how-to-read-a-book/
Historian. Husband. Iowan. Pittsburgh 🏳️🌈🐕🪕⚾️ Wrote a book long ago. Writing another on the Métis Rez in Nebraska. Most useful thing I’ve done is probably https://commonplace.online/article/how-to-read-a-book/
Pinned
Reposted by Scott Sandage
If you are waiting for holiday events, why not take a moment and read this excellent Jonathan Beecher Field piece from the Commonplace catalog. It looks at the widening gap between academic and popular understandings of early American topics like #Thanksgiving. 🗃️ commonplace.online/article/come...
Come On, Lilgrim - Commonplace
The gap between academic and popular understandings of early American topics is an enduring challenge for early Americanists. In the case of Thanksgiving, that gap is widening.
commonplace.online
November 27, 2025 at 5:40 PM
If you are waiting for holiday events, why not take a moment and read this excellent Jonathan Beecher Field piece from the Commonplace catalog. It looks at the widening gap between academic and popular understandings of early American topics like #Thanksgiving. 🗃️ commonplace.online/article/come...
Reposted by Scott Sandage
. . . formal?
formal launch?
I don't think that those words describe reality, exactly. I guess I don't know what words mean anymore?
formal launch?
I don't think that those words describe reality, exactly. I guess I don't know what words mean anymore?
With Thanksgiving and the formal launch of the holiday shopping season, Americans will again take to the road for holiday gatherings before knocking off items on their Christmas gift lists.
What's open on Thanksgiving? Not much, as many stores rest -- or prepare -- ahead of Black Friday
With Thanksgiving and the formal launch of the holiday shopping season, Americans will again take to the road for holiday gatherings before knocking off items on their Christmas gift lists.
bit.ly
November 26, 2025 at 7:04 PM
. . . formal?
formal launch?
I don't think that those words describe reality, exactly. I guess I don't know what words mean anymore?
formal launch?
I don't think that those words describe reality, exactly. I guess I don't know what words mean anymore?
Reposted by Scott Sandage
In 1925, President Calvin Coolidge refused an apple #pie for Thanksgiving because its acceptance might signal endorsement of an apple week festival.
November 26, 2025 at 4:26 PM
In 1925, President Calvin Coolidge refused an apple #pie for Thanksgiving because its acceptance might signal endorsement of an apple week festival.
Reposted by Scott Sandage
"Google at its peak was basically the best information retrieval system in human history and they and every competitor decided going from there to “you didn’t want answers you wanted half-assed auto-complete 80%-wrong hallucinations” in a few years was the right idea" -- @davelevitan.bsky.social
November 26, 2025 at 1:26 PM
"Google at its peak was basically the best information retrieval system in human history and they and every competitor decided going from there to “you didn’t want answers you wanted half-assed auto-complete 80%-wrong hallucinations” in a few years was the right idea" -- @davelevitan.bsky.social
Reposted by Scott Sandage
"In 1991, a leaked memorandum on trade liberalisation sent by Larry Summers, then chief economist at the World Bank, stated that ‘the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.’"
www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
Brett Christophers · Assume the worst: Where our waste goes
Just as Big Oil has repeatedly failed to deliver on pledges to begin decarbonising, so too the promises of plastics...
www.lrb.co.uk
November 25, 2025 at 12:48 AM
"In 1991, a leaked memorandum on trade liberalisation sent by Larry Summers, then chief economist at the World Bank, stated that ‘the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.’"
www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
Reposted by Scott Sandage
For more on Hedgeman, see Jennifer Scanlon's excellent "Until There Is Justice: The Life of Anna Arnold Hedgeman" and my "The March on Washington: Jobs, Freedom, and the Forgotten History of Civil Rights"
November 17, 2025 at 6:19 PM
For more on Hedgeman, see Jennifer Scanlon's excellent "Until There Is Justice: The Life of Anna Arnold Hedgeman" and my "The March on Washington: Jobs, Freedom, and the Forgotten History of Civil Rights"
Congrats to my final grad student, Dr. Wyatt Erchak, who just defended “Private Wrongs”: A Hidden History of the First Black Civil War Regiment! Such an honor to co-advise with Edda Fields-Black here at @cmu.edu
and have as our outside reader @marcusrediker.bsky.social #skystorians
and have as our outside reader @marcusrediker.bsky.social #skystorians
November 14, 2025 at 7:32 PM
Congrats to my final grad student, Dr. Wyatt Erchak, who just defended “Private Wrongs”: A Hidden History of the First Black Civil War Regiment! Such an honor to co-advise with Edda Fields-Black here at @cmu.edu
and have as our outside reader @marcusrediker.bsky.social #skystorians
and have as our outside reader @marcusrediker.bsky.social #skystorians
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Just so goddamn disgusted with AI at the level of instruction. The students don't have a chance. AI is intellectual fentanyl. It shouldn't be this cheap. It's a gross failure of both regulation and capital markets that these companies can somehow not pay for training material but lose money anyway.
November 14, 2025 at 2:36 AM
Just so goddamn disgusted with AI at the level of instruction. The students don't have a chance. AI is intellectual fentanyl. It shouldn't be this cheap. It's a gross failure of both regulation and capital markets that these companies can somehow not pay for training material but lose money anyway.
Reposted by Scott Sandage
May I suggest this excellent Scott Sandage piece from Commonplace about his X-ray method and book-life balance. https://commonplace.online/article/how-to-read-a-book/
How to Read a Book: The X-Ray Method for Achieving a Sustainable “Book-Life Balance” - Commonplace
This is why you need a plan: to read attentively but efficiently, and sustainably, without surrendering your book-life balance.
commonplace.online
July 27, 2025 at 8:24 PM
May I suggest this excellent Scott Sandage piece from Commonplace about his X-ray method and book-life balance. https://commonplace.online/article/how-to-read-a-book/
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Exciting news. We’ve got a pub date for the 2nd edition of No Common Ground & it’s in paperback! It’ll be out Feb. 1, 2026 & there’s a 30% discount on preorders by using the code 01SOCIAL30. @uncpress.bsky.social
November 7, 2025 at 5:18 PM
Exciting news. We’ve got a pub date for the 2nd edition of No Common Ground & it’s in paperback! It’ll be out Feb. 1, 2026 & there’s a 30% discount on preorders by using the code 01SOCIAL30. @uncpress.bsky.social
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Rolling Stone and the Rise of Hip Capitalism by Charles L. Ponce de Leon
The definitive history of the magazine and a compelling story of how counterculture and capitalism got into bed together and changed American media forever. uncpress.org/978146969439...
The definitive history of the magazine and a compelling story of how counterculture and capitalism got into bed together and changed American media forever. uncpress.org/978146969439...
Rolling Stone and the Rise of Hip Capitalism
In its early years, Rolling Stone stood out on the magazine rack: an iconoclastic bimonthly aimed at young Americans, dedicated to music, culture, and politi...
uncpress.org
November 6, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Rolling Stone and the Rise of Hip Capitalism by Charles L. Ponce de Leon
The definitive history of the magazine and a compelling story of how counterculture and capitalism got into bed together and changed American media forever. uncpress.org/978146969439...
The definitive history of the magazine and a compelling story of how counterculture and capitalism got into bed together and changed American media forever. uncpress.org/978146969439...
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Thy Will Be Done by @johngmarks.com
George Washington’s legacy as both enslaver and emancipator has haunted Americans for nearly 250 years. Marks shows how every generation has rewritten that story to suit its own vision of the nation. uncpress.org/978146969352...
George Washington’s legacy as both enslaver and emancipator has haunted Americans for nearly 250 years. Marks shows how every generation has rewritten that story to suit its own vision of the nation. uncpress.org/978146969352...
Thy Will Be Done
How should we remember George Washington’s entanglement in slavery? Americans have argued over that question for nearly 250 years. More than any other Foun...
uncpress.org
November 6, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Thy Will Be Done by @johngmarks.com
George Washington’s legacy as both enslaver and emancipator has haunted Americans for nearly 250 years. Marks shows how every generation has rewritten that story to suit its own vision of the nation. uncpress.org/978146969352...
George Washington’s legacy as both enslaver and emancipator has haunted Americans for nearly 250 years. Marks shows how every generation has rewritten that story to suit its own vision of the nation. uncpress.org/978146969352...
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Cribbed from @scottsandage.bsky.social's great "X-Ray" method, gives you a clear idea from the start what battles the author is fighting and with whom:
How to Read a Book: The X-Ray Method for Achieving a Sustainable “Book-Life Balance” - Commonplace
This is why you need a plan: to read attentively but efficiently, and sustainably, without surrendering your book-life balance.
commonplace.online
November 3, 2025 at 1:29 PM
Cribbed from @scottsandage.bsky.social's great "X-Ray" method, gives you a clear idea from the start what battles the author is fighting and with whom:
Reposted by Scott Sandage
An old post from late in my Twitter days. I'm going to have to update this in some fashion for the post-generative AI context, but in that context I think something like it remains important -- perhaps is even more so. I do not think these are skills that should be outsourced, even if they could be
Reading advice for young historians
This is a sheet of reading tips I’ve developed over the past few years for my first-year students in history. I posted it on Twitter yesterday, as a png image and a tweet thread, and it got q…
memoriousblog.com
October 30, 2025 at 4:18 PM
An old post from late in my Twitter days. I'm going to have to update this in some fashion for the post-generative AI context, but in that context I think something like it remains important -- perhaps is even more so. I do not think these are skills that should be outsourced, even if they could be
Reposted by Scott Sandage
The framing of this article is deeply anti intellectual, anti Black, antisemitic and islamophobic. There was no sinister a cabal of (((intellectuals))) who magically “influenced” Mamdani, because in college, and I don’t know if the reporter knew this, students choose what courses to take
A few thoughts about this deeply-flawed Jeremy W. Peters article.(Gift link.) www.nytimes.com/2025/10/28/u...
How a Small Elite College in Maine Influenced Mamdani’s World View
www.nytimes.com
October 29, 2025 at 12:59 PM
The framing of this article is deeply anti intellectual, anti Black, antisemitic and islamophobic. There was no sinister a cabal of (((intellectuals))) who magically “influenced” Mamdani, because in college, and I don’t know if the reporter knew this, students choose what courses to take
Reposted by Scott Sandage
THANK YOU, LESLIE HARRIS!!!!!!!!!
October 16, 2025 at 4:12 PM
THANK YOU, LESLIE HARRIS!!!!!!!!!
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Wonderful remarks at last night's Northwestern faculty assembly by history professor Leslie Harris, urging Northwestern to fight back against $700M+ in (still unexplained!) cuts by the Trump administration.
youtu.be/5xotITMNAaU?...
youtu.be/5xotITMNAaU?...
Leslie Harris, Northwestern University Faculty Assembly, Oct. 15, 2025
YouTube video by Michael Peshkin
youtu.be
October 17, 2025 at 1:42 AM
Wonderful remarks at last night's Northwestern faculty assembly by history professor Leslie Harris, urging Northwestern to fight back against $700M+ in (still unexplained!) cuts by the Trump administration.
youtu.be/5xotITMNAaU?...
youtu.be/5xotITMNAaU?...
Reposted by Scott Sandage
My book about a female cyclist was too radical for storytime - The Seattle Times
replica.seattletimes.com
October 14, 2025 at 3:52 PM
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Thomas Jefferson,,the founder of UVA professed “hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man." The federal “compact” is a form of tyranny. Do the right thing, UVA.
October 17, 2025 at 1:15 PM
Thomas Jefferson,,the founder of UVA professed “hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man." The federal “compact” is a form of tyranny. Do the right thing, UVA.
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Many, many alums like myself are opposed to UVA signing the "compact," which is designed to destroy the university as a space of free inquiry. It will be a sad day for UVA if the admin goes against the will of its students, faculty, staff, & alums.
Thomas Jefferson,,the founder of UVA professed “hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man." The federal “compact” is a form of tyranny. Do the right thing, UVA.
October 17, 2025 at 1:27 PM
Many, many alums like myself are opposed to UVA signing the "compact," which is designed to destroy the university as a space of free inquiry. It will be a sad day for UVA if the admin goes against the will of its students, faculty, staff, & alums.
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Reposted by Scott Sandage
One of the most interesting methods I've seen.
As a slow reader I've come to something similar through the close reading of structure. (Part of the reason I'm obsessed w/ pics, chronology & index.)
Sandage's x-ray method is fully fleshed out, next level & sympathetic to the process of learning. 🫀
As a slow reader I've come to something similar through the close reading of structure. (Part of the reason I'm obsessed w/ pics, chronology & index.)
Sandage's x-ray method is fully fleshed out, next level & sympathetic to the process of learning. 🫀
July 28, 2025 at 11:51 AM
One of the most interesting methods I've seen.
As a slow reader I've come to something similar through the close reading of structure. (Part of the reason I'm obsessed w/ pics, chronology & index.)
Sandage's x-ray method is fully fleshed out, next level & sympathetic to the process of learning. 🫀
As a slow reader I've come to something similar through the close reading of structure. (Part of the reason I'm obsessed w/ pics, chronology & index.)
Sandage's x-ray method is fully fleshed out, next level & sympathetic to the process of learning. 🫀
Reposted by Scott Sandage
rereading rochelle davis for a thing this afternoon and omfg does it ever hit hard right now
October 16, 2025 at 4:39 PM
rereading rochelle davis for a thing this afternoon and omfg does it ever hit hard right now
Reposted by Scott Sandage
Don’t believe it that faculty members are the problem. Many of them with the most to lose are they very ones putting themselves on the line to directly speak truth to power.
youtu.be/xqLsgqOwNBM?...
youtu.be/xqLsgqOwNBM?...
Leslie Harris, Northwestern University Faculty Assembly, Oct. 15, 2025
YouTube video by Michael Peshkin
youtu.be
October 16, 2025 at 4:07 PM
Don’t believe it that faculty members are the problem. Many of them with the most to lose are they very ones putting themselves on the line to directly speak truth to power.
youtu.be/xqLsgqOwNBM?...
youtu.be/xqLsgqOwNBM?...