History Talk

Peter Mansoor discusses his new book, Redemption: MacArthur and the Campaign for the Philippines, focusing on the strategic and operational decisions made by American and Japanese leaders, the organization of military forces, air and naval actions, intelligence, logistics, and guerrilla warfare. Redemption is both a campaign history and a study in the strategic leadership of General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, for both aspects are required to understand the totality of the largest American campaign in the Pacific during World War II. This talk explores the complexities of the Philippines campaign and MacArthur's role in it.Peter R. Mansoor, Professor, General Raymond E. Mason Jr. Chair in Military HistoryNicholas Breyfogle (Moderator), Professor of History and Director, Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching, The Ohio State University.

In this talk, OSU Professor Cabanes, who undertook several research trips to Palau between 2017 and 2023, explores the intertwined memories—American, Japanese, and Palauan—of one of the most violent battles of the Pacific War. The battle of Peleliu devastated local communities, remade landscapes, and took the lives of thousands of U.S. Marines and Japanese soldiers. Cabanes meditates on the nature of memory and forgetting, the presence of the past in the present, and the challenges of writing histories shaped by trauma.Bruno Cabanes, Professor and Donald G. & Mary A. Dunn Chair in Modern Military HistoryNicholas Breyfogle (Moderator), Professor of History and Director, Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching, The Ohio State University

Ohio State faculty experts hold a conversation that puts American domestic policy changes during the first 100 days of the second Trump administration into historical perspective.Panel Members: Bart Elmore, Professor of History, The Ohio State UniversityMaria Hammack, Assistant Professor of History, The Ohio State UniversityClay Howard, Associate Professor of History, The Ohio State UniversityDaniel Rivers, Associate Professor of History, The Ohio State University Nicholas Breyfogle (Moderator), Professor of History and Director, Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching, The Ohio State University.This is a production of Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective at the Goldberg Center in the Department of History at The Ohio State University and the Department of History at Miami University. Be sure to subscribe to our channel to receive updates about our videos and podcasts. For more information about Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective, please visit origins.osu.edu.

Ohio State faculty experts hold a conversation that puts American foreign policy changes during the first 100 days of the second Trump administration into historical perspective.Panel Members:Peter L. Hahn, Distinguished University Professor of History, The Ohio State UniversityMitchell Lerner, Professor of History and Director of the East Asian Studies Center, The Ohio State UniversityJennifer Mitzen, Professor of Political Science, The Ohio State UniversityChristopher McKnight Nichols, Wayne Woodrow Hayes Chair in National Security Studies and Professor of History, The Ohio State University Dorothy Noyes (Moderator), Director, Mershon Center for International Security Studies, Arts & Sciences Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Studies

Who doesn’t love penguins? Join Ellen Arnold to learn about the many different roles that penguins took on as Europeans first began to encounter them in the mid-1500s, from quirky oddity to salvation for the starving. Over the course of the following centuries, Europeans had many different interactions with penguins, and these shaped how they understood what the birds were. Sailors and scientists alike brought back accounts of the strange birds, which were only slowly understood to be unique to the South.Featuring Ellen Arnold, an environmental historian and Senior Lecturer in the Ohio State University Department of History. Moderated by Nicholas Breyfogle, Professor of History and Director of the Harvey Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching.

This presentation commemorates the 40th anniversary of the Bhopal Gas Disaster (2-3 December, 1984 in Bhopal, India), the world’s worst industrial disaster. Dr. Madhumita Dutta, Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at The Ohio State University discusses the disaster, the immediate and ongoing health repercussions for the people of Bhopal, and their global legal and activist fight for justice and corporate accountability. Nicholas Breyfogle, Professor in the Department of History at The Ohio State University and Director of the Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching, serves as moderator. This is a production of the College of Arts & Sciences and Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective at the Goldberg Center in the Department of History at The Ohio State University and the Department of History at Miami University. Be sure to subscribe to our channel to receive updates about our videos and podcasts. For more information about Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective, please visit http://origins.osu.edu. Follow us on Facebook, Instragram and Bluesky: @Origins OSU.

While most of the books written about the Salem witch trials concern those who were accused of witchcraft and their accusers, Matt Goldish's new book, Science and Specters at Salem, turns the spotlight on the judges. They were, after all, the men who decided to accept these accusations and move the trials forward. Historians have long wondered why the judges accepted evidence based on visions of apparitions and "touch tests.” Goldish offers some unexpected answers. Speaker Note: Matt Goldish would like to add a more complete response to one of the questions asked him after his talk. Not all those convicted in Salem were executed. Anyone who confessed was, paradoxically, kept alive, while those convicted who would not confess were executed. Presumably, those who confessed would have been executed eventually if the trials had been allowed to continue. In addition, Elizabeth Procter was spared because she was pregnant and the court wished to spare the life of the unborn child. Presented by Matt Goldish, Samuel M. and Esther Melton Chair in History at The Ohio State University. The moderator is Nicholas Breyfogle, Co-Editor of Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective, Director of the Harvey Goldberg Center and Professor of History at Ohio State University. A transcript of this podcast can be found at https://origins.osu.edu/listen/history-talk/judges-salem-witch-trials This is a production of the College of Arts & Sciences and Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective at the Goldberg Center in the Department of History at The Ohio State University and the Department of History at Miami University. Be sure to subscribe to our channel to receive updates about our videos and podcasts. For more information about Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective, please visit http://origins.osu.edu. Connect with us! Email: [email protected], Instagram: @OriginsOSU Facebook: @OriginsOSU Find transcripts, background reading, and more at origins.osu.edu

Presented by Lydia Walker, Provost Scholar Assistant Professor, Seth Andre Myers Chair in Global Military History, in the Department of History at The Ohio State University. After the Second World War, national self-determination became a recognized international norm, yet it only extended to former colonies. Groups within postcolonial states that made alternative sovereign claims were disregarded or actively suppressed. This talk showcases their contested histories, highlighting little-known regions in South Asia and Southern Africa, marginalized individuals, and their hidden (or lost) archives. Personal connections linked disparate nationalist struggles across the globe through advocacy networks. However, these advocates had their own agendas and allegiances, which could undermine the autonomy of the claimants they supported. This webinar features material from Lydia Walker’s new book, "States-in-Waiting" (Cambridge, 2024) which illuminates the unfinished and improvised ways that the state-centric international system replaced empire, which left certain claims of sovereignty perpetually awaiting recognition. The book is available Open Access for free download at https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/statesinwaiting/9446AB4E4355759A4500202B9C0F9C25 A transcript of this podcast is available at: https://origins.osu.edu/listen/history-talk/postwar-decolonization-and-its-discontents. The Moderator is Nicholas Breyfogle, Professor of History and Director, Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching at The Ohio State University.

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated existing trends that put at risk the viability of many colleges and universities, as well as that of the towns and cities in which they are located. With the post-COVID-19 shift to more remote work, and millions of people moving to more affordable and livable cities, a place that wants to attract talent will require a thriving academic environment. This represents a new opportunity for “town and gown” to create dynamic, thriving communities. Associate Professor David Staley outlines a talent magnet strategy that offers colleges and towns a plan of action for regeneration, affording institutions of higher learning the opportunity to reinvent themselves and become talent magnets. Panelists: David Staley is an historiographer, writer, designer, futurist, and journalist. He is an Associate Professor in the Departments of History, Design and Educational Studies at The Ohio State University. Nicholas Breyfogle (Moderator), Associate Professor of History and Director, Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching, The Ohio State University.

Facing the harrowing task of rebuilding a life in the wake of the Holocaust, many Jewish survivors, community and religious leaders, and Allied soldiers viewed marriage between Jewish women and military personnel as a way to move forward after unspeakable loss. Proponents believed that these unions were more than just a ticket out of war-torn Europe: they would help the Jewish people repopulate after the attempted annihilation of European Jewry. Historian Robin Judd, whose grandmother survived the Holocaust and married an American soldier after liberation, introduces us to the Jewish women who lived through genocide and went on to wed American, Canadian, and British military personnel after the war. She offers an intimate portrait of how these unions emerged and developed—from meeting and courtship to marriage and immigration to life in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom—and shows how they helped shape the postwar world by touching thousands of lives, including those of the chaplains who officiated their weddings, the Allied authorities whose policy decisions structured the couples' fates, and the bureaucrats involved in immigration and acculturation. The stories Judd tells are at once heartbreaking and restorative, and she vividly captures how the exhilaration of the brides' early romances coexisted with survivor's guilt, grief, and apprehension at the challenges of starting a new life of starting a new life in a new land. Robin E. Judd is an Associate Professor of History at The Ohio State University, Director of the Hoffman Leaders and Leadership in History Program, and President of the Association for Jewish Studies. Nicholas Breyfogle (Moderator) is an Associate Professor of History and Director of the Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching at The Ohio State University.