The Invasion of America

As my students know I've been on a map and GIS kick.  Some people have asked me what historians would do with GIS.  One answer can be found with the work of my students in the Digital History class where we began mapping the SBU cemetery.

I would also point you towards the story Interactive Time-Lapse Map Shows How the U. S. Took More than 1.5 Billion Acres from Native Americans in Slate's history column, The Vault.  You can visit the Invasion of America webpage directly to see more, including the original source maps that were used to make the interactive map.  Below is the video version of the map from YouTube.

Summer Odd and Ends

Summer is a quiet time in academics.  I taught History 475:  World War II for the first summer session and I'm editing my book.  For my students, yes we really do drafts and sometimes our first drafts need a lot of work.  I've also been watching the World Cup.  In the spirit of summer, the World Cup, and history here is a link to A Brief History of the World Cup from Time.  If you want to get completely geeky about the World Cup, you can follow it on fivethirtyeight.com.

Gettysburg National Park: A Photo Essay

Over the Memorial Day weekend, I finally had a chance to visit Gettysburg National Park. Here are a few photos from the visit!

Bona History Grad Receives Prestigious Recognition

(Timothy Rothang, center left, stands with legislator Kate Browning, left) 

The Huntington Chamber of Commerce nominated Timothy Rothang one of Long Island’s 2014 Top Young Professionals. Timothy graduated from St. Bonaventure University in 2006 with a Bachelor’s Degree in History and currently works as legislator Kate Browning's legislative aide. He received a proclamation and glass plaque at The Crescent Beach Club in Bayville on May 6, 2014. Congratulations!

Call for Summer Contributions!

We want to hear from you! If you do anything related to history over the summer break, let us know. We'd love to post your adventures on our blog. Whether you visit a historical site, volunteer at a historical site, or read something related to history, please contact us. Just get in touch with Dr. Maddalena Marinari if you wish to write a short post for us. We look forward to hearing from you!

Blending History and Journalism by Rachel Farrell

SBU senior Emmariah Holcomb presents

her part of the presentation at the JJCHC

In this semester’s Journalism and Mass Communication class, Women, Minorities and the Media, students had the opportunity to learn about advocacy journalism and how specific women and minority groups helped to shape the media industry. The class studied historically significant advocacy journalists presented through required reading and then conducted research on lesser-known individuals who fit the classification as advocacy journalists.

The research goal was to bring to light the works of individuals to highlight in a paper entitled, "Mediation: Instrument of Change," and present them at this year’s Joint Journalism & Communication History Conference (JJCHC).

One reviewer of the proposal noted: “I love the idea of having a student panel at the conference and applaud the efforts of the course instructors at Saint Bonaventure for this idea.”

The JJCHC is made possible through collaboration between the American Journalism Historians Association and the History Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. A short video at the following link gives more information about the conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xmB3lfyvhA

SBU students emphasized the works of journalists such as Randy Shilts, a ground-breaking gay journalist (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsUMFPvZ6w0); Veronica Guerin, an Irish crime reporter murdered for her activism (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHjgYKXuBPw); and Melissa Fabello, who maintains a strong online presence to educate people about hot topics such as gender identity, feminism and eating disorders (https://www.youtube.com/user/mfabello).

The evolution of journalism, whose basis is in service to the people, to educate and advocate for good, is an interesting topic of study, and one that I have enjoyed pursuing further over the last months. Anyone interested in the topic would benefit from the class, one I highly recommend.

Photos from the 2014 Arts & Sciences Expo

Several of our history majors presented their research at this year's Arts & Sciences Exposition. They included Daniel Leopold, Nick Siciliano, Matt Zaros, Max Schneller, and Dr. Payne's entire digital history class. Congratulations everyone!