Hi everyone,

My social-media feeds are filled with hope, for once, as friends and family not only start to get their vaccines, but finish their second doses, and more folks become eligible every day. Even though our 2021 conference is virtual, I am also feeling increasingly confident that we’ll be in Detroit next year and back to a new kind of normal by the end of this fall.

But there have been some really ugly events over the past couple of months that we as media historians need to meditate on and respond to. The first is the racist attack in Atlanta that killed eight people, include six Asian Americans. Your division leadership denounces this senseless violence and we affirm the life and dignity of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI), many of whom we count as valued colleagues and friends. For more on how to help proactively, check out groups like Stop AAPI Hate and AAPI Women Lead.

The past year has been full of violence, from the murder of George Floyd last summer to the Jan. 6 attach on the U.S. Capitol and the shooting (last week as I write this) in Boulder, Colorado. It can be hard to know what to do, as scholars. We can and should roundly condemn these acts of violence and repression, but we should then use our classrooms and our scholarship to confront the endemic issues that cause them.

I had an opportunity to talk briefly about this with Dr. Rachel Grant, an assistant professor at the University of Florida, and our Clio newsletter editor, who does vital research on race, social movements, social justice, and Black feminism, often through a media-historian’s lens. She encouraged me to call on the allies of Black and Indigenous people, along with other historically underrepresented groups, to stand with and support them.

Having courageous conversations with students in the classroom, whether it be via Zoom, a hybrid format, or in person, is a lot easier to write about than to do. While I try to foster a dynamic, healthy space for hard topics, like the baked-in history of racism in American institutions like journalism or the military, I of course fall short. I don’t always know what to say, how to create a safe space for conversation, or how to help students discuss these topics when confronting institutional racism makes me uncomfortable as well.  

But just because it’s hard or awkward doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. I encourage our members to engage head on with current events, using the crucial context of history. We have some good resources on our division page (and that will migrate to our new site), but other sites and organizations that might help with teaching the media history of systematic racism include Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research, the Organization for American Historians, and Blackpast.org. 

Finally, I would also urge you to read, cite and teach the work of our own members – especially members from historically underrepresented groups – who study these issues.

With our conference, I am hoping for a good showing of research on issues and representation, and want to thank our reviewers for their help, in advance. This column may not appear before the deadline, but I also want to thank those who submitted their work this year amidst really trying circumstances. I also wanted to encourage you, too, that if you just did not have the bandwidth to do so, to please continue your membership and to submit next year.

Please reach out to our research chair, Dr. Maddie Liseblad, at maddie madeleine.liseblad@mtsu.edu, if you have a question about the paper competition (or just to thank her for all she does!).

We will have more information on our conference programming once we get through the judging process, but Cayce and I are excited about we already have in store. We’ll be in touch with further details as we get them.

Don’t forget to join our more secure, revamped Facebook group, “History Division,” if you haven’t had the chance to do so.

Please reach out to me at wmari1@lsu.edu, wtmari@gmail.com, or @willthewordguy, on Twitter, if you need anything or have any questions or suggestions.

#mediahistorymatters and so do you—please continue to stay safe, and we’ll be in touch again soon.