[16 years ago this week, I launched this AmericanStudies daily blog. For this year’s anniversary series, I thought I’d revisit some significant months across those 16 years, leading up to my usual weekend thank-full post paying tribute to some of the countless folks who’ve helped along the way.]
Gee, what was going on in the spring of 2020? (Until recently that question might have been asked genuinely, as we seemed poised to memory-hole Covid just as American society did with the 1918 influenza epidemic; but this past summer the GOP decided to relitigate Covid through sustained, nonsensical attacks on Dr. Fauci.) It’s not just that I wrote in March and scheduled for early May a weeklong blog series on epidemics in American history, and ended it with a post on Covid (drafted in that May moment to be as immediate as possible) that feels like a stunning primary source document these 6.5 years later. Or that I followed it with a very unique and important semester reflections series, culminating in this post on key lessons learned from that incredibly challenging semester. Both of those series did and do certainly reflect how much this blog has continued to evolve as the America it Studies does, and I hope that will always be the case. But I would add this: AmericanStudier was very high on the list of what got me through that locked-down period, and I believe (having heard this from a number of folks) that it was on that list for others as well. If I ever doubt whether I want to keep this going, and I’m human so of course I have at times, it’s that moment to which I return to remind myself of why I do this work.
Last monthly moment tomorrow,
Ben
PS. Whether you’re a recent or long-time reader, say hi in comments, please!
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