History

By Joan Wallach Scott, Professor Emerita in the School of Social Science:

"In his recent essay in these pages on the vexed question of 'presentism' in the discipline of history, David Bell offers a soothing alternative to the American Historical Association president James Sweet’s clumsy dismissal of 'presentism' as a deviation from the true path of historical scholarship."

By Angelos Chaniotis, Professor in the School of Historical Studies: 

"According to an anecdote known in several variations, some people debate what would have changed in the history of the world if Khrushchev had been assassinated in 1963 instead of Kennedy. A well-known statesman gave a sharp response: 'Only one thing is certain: Onassis would not have married his widow.'"

Though it may seem far removed from the noise of the contemporary world, the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) has a long history of combating threats to its scholars and their work. Recent executive orders by President Trump attempting to enforce...

Jonathan Israel, Professor Emeritus in the School of Historical Studies, has been awarded the 2017 Comenius Prize by the Foundation of the Comenius Museum in the Netherlands.

Jonathan Israel, Professor Emeritus in the School of Historical Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, will a give a public lecture, “Contesting American Values: The Bumpy Rise of Democracy in the West (1776-1850),” on Friday, October 28, which...

Russian spies held a morbid fascination in the minds of Americans dating back to the Red Scare in 1919, following the Bolshevik Revolution and the creation of the Communist International, of which the Communist Party of the USA became a constituent...