Subject: State of the Profession/AHA Panels
To: h-diplo@h-net.msu.edu
Date: Fri, 10 Oct 1997 11:30:22 -0400 (EDT)
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23-upenn3.1]

On September 28, Hubert van Tuyll raised the issue of
"establishing an alternative organizational home for historians." David
Kaiser then noted that an effort of this sort was afoot, and David
Broscious said he would like to hear more about it.

A new organization, to be called "The Historical Society," is in
fact now in the process of being set up. Those of us involved in this
effort feel that there is a need for some organization where people from
all over the profession can interact with each other and engage in
serious dialogue. The AHA once served this function, but, as we see it,
it no longer does. We just don't find the sort of thing that goes on at
the AHA meetings to be of much interest, and most of us dropped out of
that organization years ago.

The other big factor has to do with the issue of "political
correctness." The AHA takes stands on political issues. (Its adoption
of a nuclear freeze resolution in 1982 was what led me personally to
quit the organization.) Those of us involved in the effort to create a
new body do not think it's appropriate for an organization which purports
to represent the profession as a whole to take positions on political
issues. We don't think it's right for a professional organization to
have rules about gender balance in the composition of panels. Rules of
that sort reflect the ideology of a faction, albeit a faction which has
come to occupy positions of power within the academic world. And we also
feel that the "privileging" of a certain sort of history, as reflected in
the composition of panels at AHA meetings, also reflects a kind of
ideological commitment.

Those of us who do not share that vision of what the profession
should be, or do not accept the idea that the profession should have a
kind of established ideology, wanted to take a stand and make it clear
that the new orthodoxy has not been universally accepted. The
establishment of a new organization is our way of underscoring the depth
of our displeasure with what has happened to the AHA, and is our way of
making it clear what we think a professional historical organization
should be.

Now, I think there are many people who would agree with at least
some of what I've said, but who do not agree that setting up a new
organization is the way to go. David Kaiser, for example, does not see
why we should give up on the AHA and thus "cede the official organization
to current fashion." Dane Hartgrove and Jeffrey Vanke think that "like
it or not," the AHA is here to stay, and are worried about losing access
to the funding the AHA supplies.

Well, of course the AHA is here to stay, but its status as an
"official" organization is not unshakeable. The AHA does not have a
God-given right to "official" status. It had a right to that status only
when it stood for the most basic values shared by the profession as a
whole. By its behavior in recent years, it has forfeited that right, and
it is important now that it be revealed for what it is, or really what it
has become--that is, it is important that we no longer go along with the
charade of pretending the AHA represents the profession as a whole. And
a new organization, by its very existence, makes the point that the AHA
is not representative and thus has no right to "official" status.

Perhaps there are less extreme remedies? People sometimes
suggest that it might be possible to take over the AHA. I personally
think this is naive. Twenty years ago, an effort of that sort might have
been possible, but the people who dislike what the AHA has become have by
and large already left the organization, and so the votes just aren't
there. And as for the argument about fellowships and so on, the AHA is
not a major source of funding, certainly not for people like us. My
sense, in fact, is that the new organization has a much better chance of
getting grants and funneling money to graduate students--above all, the
graduate students in fields like ours.

It will be some time yet before The Historical Society is
officially established. But anyone who wants to get membership
information when it becomes available (there will be no dues, at least at
the start) should email me (cram@sas.upenn.edu) with the simple message:
Histsoc info.

Marc Trachtenberg
University of Pennsylvania
cram@sas.upenn.edu