Due to the success and popularity of their 2004 CIC/Gilder Lehrman Institute Seminar for professors from CIC member institutions, David W. Blight, Class of 1954 Professor of American History at Yale University (CT), and James O. Horton, Benjamin Banneker Professor of American Studies and History at George Washington University (DC), once again led a seminar in summer 2006 on “Slavery: Scholarship and Public History.” Twenty-seven faculty members in history and related fields were selected for the seminar, held June 25-28 at Columbia University in New York.

The seminar examined how historians have attempted to explain the history of slavery and its role in the formation of the nation’s political, economic, and social structure. Participants considered and discussed how historians’ changing interpretations reflect the state of American historical scholarship and the racial dynamics of the nation. The program included a field trip to visit the Gilder Lehrman Collection at the New-York Historical Society.

At the conclusion of this fifth seminar on American history that CIC has cosponsored with the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, the participating faculty members expressed gratitude for the opportunity for study on a specific topic and for the chance to meet and connect with colleagues from similar institutions. One participant praised the seminar as the “best program of this type I have ever attended,” and another said “I will definitely keep in mind how post-war celebrations in honor of Civil War veterans acted to alter the war’s meaning by concerning themselves only with the heroism of white combatants and by avoiding any reference to the institution of slavery.”

The timing of the seminar nicely complemented James Horton’s recent work on the Public Broadcasting Service series, “Slavery and the Making of America,” and his role as chief historian for the recent “Slavery in New York” exhibition at the New-York Historical Society, as well as David Blight’s receipt of the Frederick Douglass Prize and Bancroft and Lincoln Prizes for his book, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory.

Another CIC/Gilder Lehrman Seminar in American history is planned for 2007. General information on the CIC/Gilder Lehrman seminars is available here.