Miramax, Weinstein Co. pact for sequels - Entertainment News, Top News, Media - Variety

Miramax, Weinstein Co. pact for sequels - Entertainment News, Top News, Media - Variety

The Weinstein "re-invented" small movie company as cultural powerhouse. The sequel could be worth more to them than getting the entire library at some level.

A Little Perspective on the News

In a recent article on NPR, the impact of Chinese demand on the global wine market caught my eye. As a participant in a faculty trip to China, I was struck by the commonalities between the Chinese and ourselves. My exact words (preserved by our P.R. department) was, "For me, our journey to China was filled with the realization that the desires, goals, and concerns that shape life in the United States are facing the Chinese. Yes, their language and culture are different. Yes, they are still doing it by hand (the agrarian life is alive and well), but if you looked you could see that they are living the industrial revolution. The brands you know, they know. The food you eat, they are acquiring a taste for. The stuff you want to buy (everything from raw materials to luxury goods) they want to buy."

So for me the story about the growth in demand for red wine screamed western influence. I checked myself however and shot a note over to a China expert. Since I work at a school, I actually know a China expert. Yusheng Yao looked the story over and gave me his take.

"No doubt about it--the introduction of western concepts of luxury. On the other hand, Chinese have a tradition of conspicuous consumption among the rich, even if it went against Confucianism. But the taste for Bordeaux was definitely developed by the newly rich who admire the Western lifestyle."

A quick response, but it complicated by assumptions about the impact of economic growth in China. The gap between reality versus assumption concern China is an important one. There is a complex process of cultural and economic evolution taking place in the China, but that transformation is not divorced from history. The Chinese experience offers plenty of historical antecedents shaping current patterns. On the other hand, the impact of western interaction is perhaps amplifying some elements of established culture.

Strange Symmetry

South Carolina State Legislature in 1868




Tim Scott is set to become the first African-American elected from South Carolina since Reconstruction. I take issue with the idea in the NPR piece that he is the first African-American elected from the deep south since Reconstruction because Corrine Brown was elected from Florida's 3rd Congressional District in 1992. Now, we could argue about the depth of Florida's southern identity, but I will let it go.

The specter of Scott election in South Carolina is worth a brief historical note. Remember, the Civil War began in South Carolina and during Reconstruction, the federal push to insure African-American political participation championed by the Republican Party gave African-Americans a commanding presence in state legislature. The great irony is that this era's Republican party, which struggles to define itself in an era of changing demographics has been slow to embrace minority voters. The Republican Party became the party of southern white resentment in the 1960s in the aftermath of the Civil Right legislation championed by Lyndon Johnson. The pattern of catering to anti-government, anti-democrat, and pro traditional values has been the bedrock of the party since. Scott's eventually victory will give Republicans a chance to lay claim to a history of progressive policy that most people associate with Abraham Lincoln and the defense of the Union. Anyone who considers the Republican Party's Platform from 1860 must realize the party has changed. Ironically, South Carolinians' vote for secession in 1860 was triggered by the Republican Party's victory. Southerners believed the Republican Party was a hostile to southern interests. Republicans, for their part advocated for balance between national interest and state's right. At the same time, Republicans also advocated for anti-corruption and greater fiscal constraints. As the platform states, the party viewed, "the reckless extravagance which pervades every department of the Federal Government; that a return to rigid economy and accountability is indispensable to arrest the systematic plunder of the public treasury by favored partisans." Still, southerners took issue with anti-slavery elements of the platform. Scott's campaign has championed him as a conservative republican, a label that is linked, in my mind, to Republican politics in the aftermath of civil right activism in the 1960s not the Republicans of the 1860s. It could be Scott's very presence will shift the party and open a dialogue about what the Republican Party stands for in the United States. On the other hand, the anxiety and frustration the Republican Party has tapped since the 1960s may leave little room for African-American voices they have long identified with undermining southern traditions.

Wikipocalypse: The Information Problem

The recent leak of classified Afghan war documents on Wikileaks has been compared to Daniel Ellsberg’s leak of the Pentagon Papers. For me, a U.S. historian often faced with undergraduates with little or no historical understanding, the case is interesting for a variety of reasons. If this had happen in September, I’m sure a really bright first year student would have asked me about it. There is always one really bright fresh person in the survey class. I always feel sorry for them, stuck in a class of non-history majors who wish they could escape☹. Still the reality of the Wikileaks incident would be a great “teachable moment” and I would stress that from historical standpoint the emphasis on Wikileaks story is more complicated than the narrative being offered by many commentators.

First, the comparison with the Pentagon Papers incident is wrong. Like many historical comparison, it rests on an incomplete understanding of the events in question and surface identification of specific actions. The similarities between the two events are in my mind minor. Yes, both deal with the leak of government documents related to an unpopular conflict. That is where the similarities end. Daniel Ellsberg, a government insider, copied and release a finished government report prepare by experts for consumption in policy circles. In contrast, Julian Assange, the director of Wikileaks has published 91,000 reports covering the war in Afghanistan from 2004 to 2010. The difference between the information presented is stark. In the case of the Afghan Diaries, we have a series of army after action reports, raw intelligent analysis, and field interviews. While I cannot commitment on the depiction of the war effort in these documents, the reality of the different between the Pentagon Paper and Wikileaks is an important one that touches on how students will be forced to navigate the information saturated world of the future.

Wikileaks, like so many web-based information sources, excite users with vast quantity of information. I don’t want to argue about the morality of the leak. The reality of our new information reality is highlighted by the event. I don’t know how many people will read all the documents. The reality is that most people will go to some source they trust and allow that source to frame the meaning of the information. The result is of course the exact opposite of what the Internet is suppose to promote. Instead of greater individual awareness based on primary source analysis, people have facts, but often do not put in the time necessary to create a balance holistic picture. From my own experience in the classroom I know the difficulties students experience while trying to create a coherent narrative from studying primary document.

For many of my students (and adults), having information is knowledge. This is not true. Many people don’t have strong sense of information judgment, meaning having been expose to a specific fact, they can apply that information in a balance way considering multiple variables to achieve a logical conclusion. At Rollins, we constantly discussing the nature of liberal art education in 21st century and as a result, I have made a deliberate effort to make research and writing using primary sources a big part of survey classes. I have done it through my own digital history projects and by participating in with national collaborative project such as the History Engine initiative. Sponsored by the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Arts Education (NITLE), the History Engine Project allows students to write “episodes,” short narrative based on primary documents. These episodes are complied in a searchable database. In both cases, these projects force students to contextual raw data into a narrative form. In doing so, the student must make judgments about facts, identify key issues, and apply a reasonable analysis of causal links and societal consequences. These assignments are great learning experience for students. They are forced to slow down and try to think in-depth about raw unfiltered information. As a result, they asked questions about bias, they are confronted by the important of individual perspective shaping data and they see how easily minority views can be omitted or suppressed. It makes them more careful readers of historical texts and make them more invested in understanding the past.

What do I take from these experiences? I think it highlights that the people who benefit the most for the vast amount of information available on the web are those people who have the motivation, skills, and resources to comb through the information. The difference between the Pentagon Papers and Afghan Diaries is stark in this regard. If you have read the Pentagon papers, you immediate recognize the report strives to provide contexts and analysis. In contrast, the information in Afghan Diaries is raw data. This information is useful to people or organizations who are willing and capable of put in the time to comb through it and shape the raw data into actionable information. That process, my student complain, is time-consuming and painstaking. Ironically, the groups that will do the most with the information are the people motivated by bigger issues beyond simple awareness. The Taliban will scan it looking for names of people who have given assistance. Pundits on both side will read it to flush out the establish narrative from their perspective and news organizations will reference it for a fuller picture of the war. In every case, people invested for very specific reason will process the data and act on that information to further an establish agenda.

I could be wrong, perhaps millions of people are pouring through the information offered in the Afghan Diaries and getting a better sense of the realities of the U.S. war in Afghanistan. Still, unless they have been primed by an educational experience developed the habits and skills need to do that, they probably aren’t putting the time in to get the full picture. Many education professionals lament the Wikipedia effect on society. I know that I threaten students with major point deductions for citing Wikipedia in a formal paper. Yet, I recognize now that the battle over Wikipedia is loss. The key now is to teach students how to navigate sources on the web, how to judge the merit of the information and how to find supplemental information to provide context for raw primary documents on the web.

Remaking Place and Asserting Space: The Land Trust Experience in Winter Park, 1991-2010 _ Ep 4: Further Reflection on Planning

In 1902, seeking to explain the importance of city planning, Daniel H. Burnham, the foremost architect and planner in the United States wrote, In the American there is developing, a new instinct. This impulse he explained defied tradition, exploited opportunity, and strove to produce a new modern world. These attributes reflected, for many Americans, the United States place in the modern world. This new modernity framed the emergence of the Progressive Era, a period in the early twentieth century when theories of social, political, and economic efficiency seemed to promise a better society. How did the ideas of city planning change urban development? What if any of those changes relate to the urbanism today?

Planners, who comprised an amalgamation of intellectuals, social reformers, business leaders, lawyers, doctors, and government officials were driven by a progressive belief that American society could be made better, not simply better in terms of aesthetics, but better in the sense of an environmental determinism that addressed the ills of urban society. This period marks the formulation of city planning theories that allowed planning advocates to define what city planning could and should accomplish. Identified by their commitment to safeguard social unity and political cohesion that characterized the American social system, planners pursued different avenues in their search for stability. They articulated ideologies of efficiency, social welfare, and beautification in their search for the proper formula for development.

At some basic level, city planning represented a professionalization of urban development practice driven by the rise of an educated white middle-class who feared disruption rooted in the city. The push for professionalization provided this managerial oriented middle-class a tool to establish civic prominence by displacing the traditional power structure by arguing their understanding of the "new science" of city planning positioned them to make better decisions for society. Thus, from its inception, city planning established a link between middle-class social belief and regulatory standard for housing and development. The origins of the contemporary suburban experience can be traced to this period. Historian Dolores Hayden writes that the source of United States postwar housing policy grew from the need to fulfill ideas of family and work more applicable to the nineteenth century idea of home and work rapid developing in the Twentieth century.

Our research on the Hannibal Square Community Land Trust links directly to this ongoing debate in American planning literature. As we talk to people and explore the history of the organization, one clear barrier to the success of the HSCLT is the traditional desire to own a home. Let me explain. The CLT in Winter Park like CLT around the country operate by holding land in trust and selling the home. CLTs prevent market forces from raising prices and keeps homes within reach of families who could not traditional participate in the housing market.

This process however runs counter to what Americans believe should happen when they buy a home. CLT homeowners own the home and leases the land. This is not the traditional owner model and while the CLT provides a unique opportunity to buy homes, many people who may qualify resist participating. For African-American especially, the thought they will not own the land, an idea deeply rooted in the psyche as a symbol of citizenship, is troubling. I would argue that one obstacle for the HSCLT to overcome is the belief, born in the aftermath of the Civil War, that African-American must acquire and hold land to be secure in the United States. This belief, best summed up with the phrase "40 acres and a Mule" grew from the action of William T. Sherman, who issues Special Field Order No. 15 in 1865 grant land to former slaves in Georgia. The special order was rescinded by President Andrew Johnson within a year and the hopes for African-American land ownership were caught in the politics of Reconstruction. Regardless, the ideas remains a reference point for African-Americans. In the aftermath of slavery sleeking and holding land was one mechanism to demonstrate freedom.

As I have noted in earlier episodes, Winter Park was planned with African-American property owners as a goal. In the years since the town's founding, African-Americans have maintained ownership, but the value of their land has not matched their white counterparts--a clear legacy of racism. At the same time, development pressure have increasingly focused on Hannibal Square, in part because the area east of the railroad track is too expensive for new development. For African-Americans struggling to hold on land that has been in their families for generation, the pattern of recent development tells a story of African-American displacement driven by white land speculators, white businesses, and new white residents. How can those African-American residents support the HSCLT? For them the HSCLT provides homes without land, a model that counters both the history and desire promoted in the American experience.

The HSCLT can be one way to stabilize the housing market in this traditional African-American neighborhood and provide an opportunity for a new generation of low to moderate income homeowners to live in Hannibal Square, yet to achieve that goal, a new narrative of home ownership will need to be created and nurtured within the community.

Remaking Place and Asserting Space: The Land Trust Experience in Winter Park, 1991-2010__Ep 3: The Making of a Theortical Framework

Photos by Kelsey Von Wormer












The Plan for Winter Park








Allison England and I continue our efforts to understand the CLT experience in Winter Park. We can say firmly--there is a complex story related to housing policy and local story. We continue to deepen our understanding of local story. Recently, we took a walking tour around Hannibal Square. As the images can attest, the physical layout of the community tell a story about development on the "other side of the tracks." There are a number of possible avenue we can take to highlight, understand, and explain the Winter Park experience. Incorporating the established literature on race and housing, we can place the local African-American experience within a broader regional perspective. Recently Allison reviewed Andrew Wiese's work and noted the “domestic service employment suburb” that housed “shopkeepers, mechanics, industrial workers, and the servants who made it possible for white residents to "live comfortably in the palatial homes" within whites communities he identified in his research relates easily to the Winter Park experience. In addition, we have considered the work of Gwendolyn Wright and Dolores Hayden to understand the social implications associated with the home. Our analysis has established a strong culture of property ownership for African-Americans and the implications of that culture on perceptions about community continue to shape resident's perceptions, even as broader economic, social, and political changes have worked to marginalize Hannibal Square.

For me, as a historian of urban planning history, I can see how traditional tensions over race and class framed Winter Park's development. As we move forward I think our research will allow us to explore the link between community, policy, and the home. As we currently struggle over the effort to promote middle-class homeownership, the history of this type of policy offers important lessons. Key to this analysis in my opinion is how the assumptions about property and public policy practice at the turn of the century--social control, order, and modernity were refined in significant ways by municipalities throughout the twentieth century. In Florida, the importance of modernity, consumer consumption, and the socialization of space play a crucial part shaping perceptions of the lived experience. Winter Park's story can and will inform our understanding of the American housing experience.

Remaking Place and Asserting Space: The Land Trust Experience in Winter Park, 1991-2010__Ep 2: The Story Grows More Complex

Caption: Allison England working in the archive.
Photo by Julian Chambliss











Caption: Shady Park sit at the center of the Hannibal Square, the historic black community in Winter Park. Photo by Kelsey Von Wormer







Part of the value of working in the Rollins Student-Faculty Collaborative Research Program is the opportunity to pursue those ideas you don't have time to pursue during the regular academic year. Working with students to show them the reality of your discipline, getting into the archive, and making discoveries that reshape your thinking are all part of summer research. Allison England and I recently took a few days to burn through the Olin Library Archive and Special Collection vertical files on the Westside Winter Park. Some elements I knew, some I did not. Allison confessed, "It is a more complicate story than I thought." While you might rightly point out, she is new the material, in her defense, it was a more complicated story than what I thought also!


We have been doing some free writing, summarizing information and mapping out the story. Recently Allison wrote this:

Winter Park’s west side, Hannibal Square, was founded for African-American residents in 1881. By all accounts, West Winter Park was “a bustling, vibrant community that, in some ways, had more going for it than it does today.” It had a black-owned newspaper, The Advocate, catering to both blacks and whites, and two black men were twice elected as city aldermen. A negative image of West Winter Park has led to “a renaissance of sorts” by Winter Park, and a decision to revitalize and redevelop the community. The tracks running through Winter Park have historically stood as a dividing line between black and white, but this line has recently moved, causing some to wonder “if the rapid transformation of the area is a healthy boost or a destruction of culture.”

Everything she wrote is true, but that shift from "vibrant community" at its founding to "renaissance of sorts" is a complicated story. It also happen way before the story we are suppose to be talking about. As we discuss our finding, I was struck by how much the origin story of Winter Park is tied to the idea of two worlds, one black and one white and the homes in those two worlds. While I thought of our story as being about the meaning of the home in the city and the historical implication of the struggle to have a home, I had not thought about that meaning as one long narrative present at the foundation of the community. In the beginning Oliver Chapman and Loring Chase purchased 600 acres bordering Lakes Maitland and Osceola with the goal of creating a beautiful winter residential community for wealthy northerners. Between 1881 and 1885, they developed and advertised the new town of Winter Park located just four miles from the county seat. Chase and Chapman relied on the area’s natural beauty to entice visitors and to support the image of a community as tourist destination. Between 1882 and 1886 Chase oversaw the construction of the Seminole Hotel. Reminiscent of the coastal luxury hotels owned by Henry Flagler, the Seminole was situated on Lake Osceola and offered two hundred guest rooms and amenities that included sailing, rowing, fishing, and two steam yachts for guests. The hotel and the agricultural business developing in Central Florida required labor and African-Americans were crucial for the hotel and the groves in the area. When plotting the original town, Chase and Chapman set aside plats to the west of the rail tracks to be sold to African-Americans at a low price with the restriction that they must erect a home on the lot. Thus, the African-American labor in Winter Park, like much of the South, allowed the community to function. Yet, the sale of land and the demand to build a home, also created a vibrant community of property holding African-Americans. Indeed, the town could not have been incorporated without the support of African-American residents in Hannibal Square. Hannibal Square was the heart of the black community and residents enjoyed relative economic stability and strong community organization at a time when southern Democrats moved to redeem the South after a decade long effort to reconstruct society. The growth of Hannibal Square coincided with the emergence of Eatonville, FL (the oldest incorporate African-American community in the United States) and the two communities shared cultural and educational links. In 1887,Gus C. Henderson, the African-American owner of local general printing and publishing company rallied African-American voters to support Loring Chase’s efforts to incorporate Winter Park. Henderson, a staunch Republican urged, the sixty-four registered African-American voters to support the measure. These votes were crucial; only forty-seven white voters were registered and the total year round African-American population outnumber the total year round white population!

The measure passed and the newly incorporated town included Hannibal Square. Reflecting the importance of the black community, the election of new aldermen included African-Americans Walter B. Simpson and Frank R. Israel representing West Winter Park. Yet, like much of the south, conflict between Democrats and Republicans and wider control of the region changed the political landscape. In 1893, William Comstock and several other residents petition the Florida legislature to detach Hannibal Square from the city. Like most African-Americans, Hannibal Square residents were Republicans and Hannibal Square represented a powerful counter to Democrats' control. The Florida Legislature voted to change the city boundary, despite local opposition. While the strong economic and social links between the black and white community continued, the political link temporary came to an end. In an ironic twist, in 1925 Winter Park once again annexed Hannibal Square when city officials realized they needed a greater population base to qualify for state funding for municipal projects. Once again, African-American property owners were needed in order for the state to designate the "Town of Winter Park" as the "City of Winter Park."

The link between the black homes and white homes in Winter Park was there at the beginning. Also at the beginning is a question of fairness, access, and power. Winter Park's one time slogan of "City of Homes" is full of meaning, as we learn more, that meaning is only become more and more complex.

Remaking Place and Asserting Space: The Land Trust Experience in Winter Park, 1991-2010_ Ep. 1

Photo: Kelsey Von Wormer

This summer I'm back working with the Rollins Student-Faculty Collaborative Research Program. My research collaborator is Allison England. Our project, as the blog title suggests is Remaking Place and Asserting Space: The Land Trust Experience in Winter Park, 1991-2010. The goal of this summer project is to create an integrated multimedia article that analyzes the history and impact of the Hannibal Square Community Land Trust (HSCLT) in terms of its own self identified goals and within the context of the affordable housing debate in the United States. Created by the Winter Park Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) in 2004, the first HSCLT homes were completed with the assistance of the Homebuilders Association, the Orlando Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, Orange County Division of Housing and Community Development, SunTrust Bank, and technical assistance from Florida Community Partners to create affordable low incoming housing for Westside Winter Park residents.

The story of the land trust is however, more complex than the simple story of its formation. Housing represent one aspect of the American dream, perhaps the biggest visible aspect of what it means to be American. One long term consequence of the economic downturn is now Americans are questioning the validity of the American dream. Does every American, if they work hard and play right, end up with a home of their own? For some the answer is suppose to be yes and not being able to hold on to their dream home is a blow to their vision of America. This issue is at the core of the ongoing debate about the housing crisis. This is our first week doing research and believe it our not, we spent some time exploring the symbolic nature of the home in the American experience. Going back to colonial era and following the idea all the way to contemporary suburbia. The true is that the physical layout of the American home and the policy governing the American housing market are linked to old ideas about what the American experience is (or what we think it is suppose to be), but those ideas have been open to manipulation by forces as wide-ranging as the writings of Andrew Jackson Downing to the provision of WWII era G.I. Bill. On top of that gender, race, and environmental concerns play a part in the discussion. In discussing things with Allison, I pointed out we don't need to reinvent the wheel. Its a good thing, the wheel is big and its only the two of us to do the whole thing in eight weeks!

On the bright side, I realize I can refer to Andrew Jackson Downing as his era Martha Stewart and someone will instantly understand who he is...I gotta remember that one for class!

The Capstone: The Historiography Situation

Reflecting on the Capstone class, I realize that the graduating seniors are walking into dangerous ground. Last week and this week, they are providing historiographical presentation of several subfields. The results vary, but that in itself is not a problem. Its an interesting exercise and they learn (some of them learn) valuable truths about the evolution of academic thought. The reality of a small history department is that the full complexity of the historical study may be loss to one our students. They probably cannot with real understanding describe what each faculty member specializes in beyond, geographic and chronological grouping. Thus to them ( and the public at large) our department is two American historians, two European historians and one Asian historian. The truth is far more complex, but from the student perspective meaningless. In part, this explains why, the historiographical presentation matters. As a urban historian (yes, I'm an Americanist, but I'm really an urbanist), I reference a very distinct chain of ideas and literature.

New methods and concerns connected to social science developed in the 1960's as a consensus among scholars pushed for scholarship with greater social relevance. Many believed that the social sciences could find solutions to modern social problems. Several unexplored fields of historical study received consideration with the intent that new scholarship would highlight different viewpoints. Urban historians abandoned examinations of elite political and social groups, instead studies began to ponder the actions and motivations of the common man living in the city. As a consequence, the "new" urban history focused on particular social questions concerning women, labor, immigrants, African-Americans and other issues. Methodological demands pushed aside themes of culture and ecology that formerly guided urban studies. Without a unifying concern urban history struggles to provide a unique insight to the city. Urban history's early foundation drew on several different sociological and historical theories. Among these early urban scholars were Max Weber and Robert Park. Weber's The City (1905) asserted that capitalism produced a crude urban environment, but not strictly in the marxist model of structure development. In 1916, Park developed the concept of urban ecology. He believed that studying the city could reveal how the urban environment shaped human culture. These works remain important because they stimulated interest in urban culture. Each essay stresses that the city's culture resulted from the cumulative effects of people living together. These early works inspired other scholars to investigate the city further.

The most prominent members of this new school of urban thinkers were not historians, but their influence shaped historical works. Louis Wirth, a sociologist from the Chicago school developed many key ideals about urban living. Wirth believed that sociology should be built around questions of human behavior. The urban environment is especially important for behavioral studies because the city's social organization leads to behavior changes and consensus driven actions. Lewis Mumford developed the community concept further. Mumford's theories on the city strove to place the urban environment within some kind of context apart from other subjects. He does not dissect the elements of the urban environment, instead he looked at the city as a separate entity apart from the country, but intimacy connected to the land and people.
The formal study of urban history started with Arthur M. Schlesinger Sr.'s 1933 volume, The Rise of the City. This book, a part of the History of American Life series, along with Schlesinger's seminal essay, "The City in American History" set the city apart from historical studies of political or industrial issues. These works established that the city itself was a framework comparable to Frederick Jackson Turner's frontier thesis. Schlesinger's urged historians to produce more urban studies that considered the unique relationships found in the city.

Several scholars answered with studies that focus exclusively on urban developments. Period history from Carl Bridenbaugh and Thomas J. Wertenbaker produced studies of Boston, New York, and Charleston during the colonial period. Urban biography offered close examination of a single city. Some notable examples are Bessie L. Pierce's Chicago (1937), Blake Mckelvey's Rochester (1945), and Bayrd Still's Milwaukee (1948). Edward Kirkland's Men, Cities, and Transportation (1948) and James W. Livingwood's The Philadelphia-Baltimore Trade Rivalry, 1780-1860 (1947) addressed issues of economics and transportation development. Various works also examined themes of immigrant life and housing. Oscar Handlin's Boston's Immigrants, 1790-1865 (1941) ranks as one of the first examinations of immigrant life. Edith Abbott's Tenements of Chicago, 1908-1935 (1936) added greater depth to questions of urban slums and housing reforms.

These histories considered the city as a community of individuals working together to build distinct cultural sphere. At their core, these early urban histories reflected the theoretical assumptions that grew out of urban social analysis. Urban biography celebrated cultural development. Each biography highlighted the organization and consensus that allowed cities to grow and prosper. These works aimed at developing a cultural interpretation of urban living that resisted broad categorization. Every city told a different story, each region reflected a different kind of community.

Stephan Thernstrom's work revealed the limitation of these studies. Thernstrom's Poverty and Progress (1964) and The Other Bostonians (1973) established a new framework in urban history. In Thernstrom's words his work differed because until then, "Virtually the only systematic mobility research in America has dealt with the social origins of members of American business elite." Thernstrom's works revealed a new complexity in American culture. Thernstrom's examination of Newburyport, Massachusetts examined social mobility in the lower classes. He characterized this mobility in terms of increasing achievement through time. Meaning that each subsequent generation had a better economic standing compared to the previous generation. The Other Bostonians furthered his study of mobility to include factors of ethnic groups and races. Both studies used examinations of census tracts, tax records, and other data to track individuals over time.

Thernstrom established several things with Poverty and Progress. First, it marked the merger of the new urban history and the new social history. Second, it was the first book to look at history from the bottom up. Third, this book brought the question of mobility to forefront of social study. Finally, it represented a methodological evolution in the historical field. Whereas general topic oriented around the culture or ecology drove urban history prior to it, after Poverty and Progress urban history strove to answer specific questions and followed assumptions connected to interpreting data on the mass population. In this framework, the United States represented a unique model of cultural assimilation and development. Class was not conceptualized clearly and the inevitable change from traditional to modern society had special ramifications for the community.

The Urban History Group's round table conference in 1966 marked the first serious evaluations of the new urban history. H.J. Dyos's essay "Agenda for Urban History," called for increased clarity, more analysis, cooperation between scholars, and greater unity in the scholarship's new direction. Urban historians debated whether or not the new social science techniques were worthwhile and how they applied directly to the study of history. It seemed obvious to most historians that the merging of more science to history was beneficial, especially in light of Thernstrom's work, but the apparent problem laid in the aims of urban history apart from the methods used. Scholars seemed unsure where the new direction in urban history would end up.
Conzen stresses that prior to quantification, urban history's concerned itself with the city, "The city itself functioned as an intervening variable in some more general historical process such as populism or slavery."

After quantification scholars asked new questions with different goals in mind. The new methods needed specific factors that could be coded and analyzed. Complex questions of culture and ecology were not easy confronted with the new methods historian now utilized. The Yale conference on Nineteenth Century Cities held in 1968 reflected on the intellectual framework that developed within the field. At the conference, Norman Birnbaum's "Afterword" spoke to this point. Birnbaum pointed to common intellectual dimensions in the conference's varied presenters. First, the studies highlight a social structure in the United States that is more complex than any theorized before. Second, most of the conceptional structure associated with American society were "uncertain and fragile." Finally, quantification was an accepted tool in historical analysis.

This neat summary of trends is misleading. In reality, many urban scholars found a blanket description of urban history impossible. Leo F. Schnore pointed out that many historians argue that the new urban history seemed limited to questions of urban stratification, mobility, or spatial patterns. Furthermore, the elements of the new urban history could be traced to older works. In this atmosphere, however, agreement on two conflicting points emerged. First, historians agreed that quantitative methods addressed a limited range of substantive questions and problems. Second, scholars needed to identity what those questions should be. This inability to judge the exact direction of urban history is directly linked to quantification's influence.

The problems associated with historians and their methods is nothing new. David Potter pointed out that often, "The most important achievements of historians were attained in spite of their methods rather than by means of it." Potter's statement referred to the variety of generalizations that historian must make while writing history. Potter asserted that historians often directly slight matters of motivation, classification, and causation. In a way, quantification has directed historical studies away from these issues as they relate to the urban culture by demanding that issues that could be coded for mathematical models had to be the focus of research.

By the 1970's the search for a broader conceptual perception that would produce a unique city perspective apart from other frameworks led to new works influenced by historians like Eugene Genovese and Theodore Hershberg. The complexity of urban history is matched by other subfields. As faculty members we are tasked with making the complex clear throughout the student academic career, but in the Capstone class this complexity returns with jarring results for graduating seniors. Yet, they are not without the tools to understand these arguments.

Historical Perspective

This semester is moving along. I have the first exam to grade, a search committee to get through, and worries about next academic years to consider. Despite all of that, I'm gonna drop in on the Daily Buzz tomorrow and give some input on the Chris Matthews issue and the state of African-American marriage. Morning shows are perfect for inviting you and giving you just enough time for a soundbite. Still, as a friend one said to me, "You gotta take the information to the people."

In the case of the African-Americans and marriage, it a complicate problem. The fact of the matter is that marriage in the United State is not what it use to be. The societal restriction against divorce has lessen and as a result couples divorce at higher rates. When you factor in race, the numbers get worst, especially for African-Americans. Yet, the factor related to African-Americans marriage are not all unique to the black community. Since the 1960s, social commentators have pointed to female-head household as failure of the black family.

The causes and consequences single-family household are complicated. Conservatives point to disincentive associated with marriage and general family created by social welfare program. On the other hand, de-industrialization, suburbanization, and crime have led to problems as varied as high incarnation rate for African-American males to low educational achievement. This means young black men are not available to wed during prime marriage age. Added to that, the number of African-American men who drop out of school means there is an education deficit that affected social and economic opportunity. Consider the factors women use (regardless of race) when considering marriage: security and prospect of long terms support. In both cases African-American males often fail in the lowest percentile of any measure. Education also broadens the world view, which adds to possibility of marrying outside your racial group and pushes the median marriage age up. These factors combine to force African-American women to search longer for a suitable mate.

African-American Middle-class women (who tend not to marry outside their race) are further marginalize by stereotypes of beauty and behavior that continue to be produced by popular media. All these factors lead to troubling marriage pattern for African-Americans. Both Working-class and Middle-class African-Americans suffer from the cascading issues that undermine traditional marriage. The problem is amplified by media coverage that conflate issues related to class and race to individual moral failing and/or absence of personal responsibility.

I'm not going to solve the problem with two minute segments, but maybe I can try to clarify some of these issues.

Synergistic Flow

What do historians do exactly? It is a good question. One hundred years ago, you ask people about what historians do, they would give you a straight answer. Now, you ask me what a historian does and it is a little fuzzy. This problem (if you want to call it that) doesn't usually bother me, but in the Spring I get to deal with it head on. Every spring I'm tasked with teaching the History Department capstone course. It is the last course you every take as a history major (it suppose to be at least). The students, in victims senioritis, want to know "What do I need to do in that class?" My answer never satisfies them and to be honest....I don't worry about it. If they can't roll with the punches at this point.....life will be unpleasant. Still, I do have goals. First, I want them to tell me what a historian does. It is not an easy answer. Is History a Social Science or Humanities? History has evolved a great deal in the twentieth century, depending on your Master (sorry adviser), you look a little social science or a little humanities or a little of both. Second question, what have you (as a graduating senior) learned as a history major. No, I don't mean the facts. They didn't really learn historical facts (they did, but it not like they can rattle that off). No, I think the History Department want graduating seniors to be able to think and act with certain tools at their disposal. If they are graduating they have the tools, but it likely they have never actually processes the fact...this is how I deal with a problem. This is my process of information analysis and presentation. In the capstone...they kinda sit down and go, "Yes ,I do this and then this, and this is why I do it that way." Third, and this is a really me pushing it. I kinda want see a little synergistic flow. Yeah, they are given the change to pull things together... make presentations...pull this idea from that class and this idea from over here and maybe remember something from econ or English, or Antho or some service learning project or something they saw studying abroad and it all means.........something. At least, it suppose to to mean whatever they manage to argue in a clear and orderly way. Still, they will feel unhappy, they got to the end and here I am...messing with them.

Pray for the History Seniors. Pray they Survive.