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Category: Africa

A photograph of John Hope Franklin seated with pen and paper in hand while taking notes at the Archives Advisory Council Meeting.

Tom Cryer on How We Understand John Hope Franklin’s Legacy

Posted by: Andrew Breiner

Tom Cryer is a second-year PhD student at University College’s Institute of the Americas, where his research investigates race, memory, and nationhood through the life, scholarship, and advocacy of the historian John Hope Franklin (1915-2009). He is an Events Editor at U.S. Studies Online, a Graduate Representative for the Southern Historical Association, and a host …

Sweeping view from the floor of a great room, looking upwards past marble columns and arches to a grand golden-colored dome

Kluge Fellow David Stenner Answers Four Questions About His Scholarship and Experience as a Scholar at the Kluge Center

Posted by: Michael Stratmoen

David Stenner is an Assistant Professor in the Department of History at Christopher Newport University. Originally from Germany, David has lived in the United States for over a decade. He is the author of “Globalizing Morocco: Transnational Activism and the Post-Colonial State” (Stanford University Press, 2019.) I interviewed Dr. Stenner on his research project as …

Sweeping view from the floor of a great room, looking upwards past marble columns and arches to a grand golden-colored dome

Making Black History Accessible, Through the Library of Congress

Posted by: Andrew Breiner

Jesse J. Holland joined Adam Rothman, former Kluge Center Distinguished Visiting Scholar, for “African American Passages: Black Lives in the 19th Century,” hosted by the John W. Kluge Center in the Thomas Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress on February 21 this year. Holland and Rothman discussed their experiences using the Library’s collections to …

Sweeping view from the floor of a great room, looking upwards past marble columns and arches to a grand golden-colored dome

African American Passages Episode 2: The Long Journey of Omar Ibn Said

Posted by: Andrew Breiner

In the second episode of African American Passages: Black Lives in the 19th Century, John W. Kluge Center Distinguished Visiting Scholar and Georgetown University history professor Adam Rothman looks at the story of Omar Ibn Said. Rothman is joined on the podcast by Mary-Jane Deeb, the Chief of the Library of Congress’s African and Middle …

Sweeping view from the floor of a great room, looking upwards past marble columns and arches to a grand golden-colored dome

“My Dear Master”: An Enslaved Blacksmith’s Letters to a President

Posted by: Adam Rothman

An unusual letter arrived in the mail for the Tennessee planter James K. Polk shortly after he won the 1844 presidential election. Written from Carrollton, Mississippi, and dated November 28, 1844, the letter began “My Dear Master” and was signed by “Blacksmith Harry.” Here’s what Harry wrote: Suffer your faithful survant Harry to say a …

Sweeping view from the floor of a great room, looking upwards past marble columns and arches to a grand golden-colored dome

Adam Rothman on Working With the Library’s Unique Omar Ibn Said Collection

Posted by: Andrew Breiner

While Adam Rothman, Georgetown University history professor and former Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the Kluge Center, was at the Library, he had the opportunity to work on transcribing the Library of Congress’ Omar Ibn Said Collection, which was just released online. Ibn Said was an educated, wealthy man living in West Africa until he was …

Sweeping view from the floor of a great room, looking upwards past marble columns and arches to a grand golden-colored dome

Exploring African Law and Ancient Egypt

Posted by: Travis Hensley

The following is a guest post by Alexandre Loktionov, PhD candidate in the Department of Archaeology & Anthropology at the University of Cambridge and a 2016 AHRC Fellow at The John W. Kluge Center. I am an Egyptologist happily working as a fellow at the Kluge Center of the Library of Congress. To some, I recognize that …

Sweeping view from the floor of a great room, looking upwards past marble columns and arches to a grand golden-colored dome

Africa, Past and Future: A Conversation with Toyin Falola

Posted by: Dan Turello

Members of the Scholars Council are appointed by the Librarian of Congress to advise on matters related to scholarship at the Library, with special attention to the Kluge Center and the Kluge Prize. The Council includes distinguished scholars, writers, researchers and scientists. “Insights” is featuring some of the work of this highly-accomplished group of thinkers. …