What drew me to the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation (CWF) is its vision for the future. So that the future may learn from the past, the CWF wants to build on its impressive reputation and deeds as a museum to lead in digital and virtual experiences that help people all over the world, as well as across the United States, better understand early American history and how that history is integral to the present we inhabit and experience today.
In a time when history, historical knowledge, and historical education and outreach are both crucial and beleaguered, I want to be in a position where I can work for the good of a historical organization, the historical profession, and American society. I want to do work that has a similar impact to the work I’m doing now, but on a larger scale. Serving as the executive director or president of a significant cultural institution will provide me with the opportunities I seek.
While tweeting created awareness, writing to the authors created change. It’s a small change, but small changes add up! So going forward I intend to think about not just if I should say something, but how and where I say it. There’s a difference between creating awareness and creating change and the mediums we use to communicate are often more effective at doing one than they are the other.
Historians need to stop thinking about the tenure track as the only way and as the only measure of success within the profession. The profession would instantly help improve the job market for historians by improving its ability to help students at all levels of historical training recognize and discuss their unique and valuable skill set outside of the academy. It also needs to stop treating employment within the tenure track as the only “true” job market for historians and as the only measure of success.
I’m excited to announce that I’ve joined the staff at the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture as its new Digital Projects Editor. This is a really exciting opportunity because it means long-term support for Ben Franklin’s World and the Doing History series and a chance to continue working and collaborating with the OI’s great staff of talented historians and professionals.
Over the last two years, the team at the Omohundro Institute has helped develop Ben Franklin’s World into a serious and professional media outlet for scholarly history. Their knowledge has played a major role in growing Ben Franklin’s World into a podcast that receives over 160,000 downloads per month and has garnered more than 2 million downloads in less than 3 years. Plus, the Doing History series has evolved into a dynamic series that not only shows the world how historians work and why our work matters, but encourages us to experiment with adapting our traditional modes of historical interpretation and communication to new media. (Thus far these experiments have proven successful as episodes in the Doing History: To the Revolution! series are the most downloaded episodes in the entire BFWorld catalog.)
It’s also an exciting opportunity because the Omohundro Institute is the preeminent organization in the world for early American historical scholarship. They do so much to support the work that we historians do through their fellowship and publication programs, conferences, and digital history initiatives and by challenging themselves and others to produce the best scholarship in the field. And now, Ben Franklin’s World and I get to be a BIGGER part of that work.
Going forward, listeners can still expect great interviews with scholars who work on different aspects of early American History. Episodes will continue to post on Tuesdays, just as they have been for over two and a half years, and listeners can also expect more multi-part series with narrative-style episodes.
For nearly 75 years, the Omohundro Institute has been committed to producing the best scholarship in early American history and I’m really looking forward to meeting the challenge of producing episodes that meet their high standards as well as the high standards the Ben Franklin’s World and Doing History audiences have come to expect. I’m excited to contribute to the Omohundro Institute’s long tradition of excellence.
