The phrase isn't as easy to define as one might have hoped.... There is an intuitive division of types of history in which a lot of us engage without questioning it much. If you tell me, " I'm writing a political history of the United States in the late 19th century" I expect you are working on Boss Tweed, Grover Cleveland, Ida B. Wells. "I'm writing a cultural history of the United States in the late 19th century." Ah, then I would love the chance to quiz you about the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, Thomas Nast's cartoons and the music of Victor Herbert. I've posted a photo of Victor Herbert here. To get a bit closer to what I want -- suppose you are tell me you are writing a history of economics, as a field of study, in the US during this period . Delightful! Nothing like a good discussion of Henry George, Herbert Spencer, John Bates Clark and Thorstein Veblen. But then we get back to where we began. What does an economic histor...
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GUARDIAN's style guide cautions writers about the "National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers". The caution is that the word "and" is not part of that title. There will be a temptation to insert it after "Schoolmasters" because this sounds like a merger of two originally distinct groups, sort of like the Presidents' Day of educational unions. The guide also suggests not using NASUWT. Call it by the whole long name on first mention, then say "the union" rather than using those "unlovely initials". This inspired a little research. NASUWT came into existence because of a secession in the first instance, and later a merger. In the UK, a fair number of men put aside their schoolteaching jobs to go fight the Great War in 1914. When the survivors came back, and sought a return to their civilian career, they found that women were dominating their field. They were unhappy about this. The men seceded from the N...
I recently saw the latest biopic about Apple co-founder and re-fashioner of industries Steve Jobs. It was a fine movie. The Rolling Stone reviewer calls it brilliant. But it hasn't been a commercial success. Why not? I don't know, but I'll make the simple observation that it is the antithesis of an action film. It isn't even a very visual film, it could almost have been done on the radio. Everything depended on the dialog. Still, that dialogue was very well-written and acted by a world-class cast. It is written as a three act play, and each act is a product launch. Various backstage dramas each time precede the moment when Jobs walks on stage to unveil a new product to the world. We also get some quick flash back scenes to events the characters are talking about, and some very brief news anchor narration in inter-act transitions. The essentials of the familiar story are conveyed through this structure. Job and Woz co-founded Apple. As it outgrew them, Woz ...
If you wanted to write the recent history of global oil markets, and you wanted to take a Carlylean (or Jamesian) view thereof, who are the outstanding individuals on whose work you might focus? Working from a recent WSJ feature, here are six: Nikolay Buynov: Russian entrepreneur Mohammad al-Sabban: Saudi economist/consultant Gary C. Evans: US/Texas based CEO Yin Shenping: China, entrepreneur on the oil/IT interface Scott Saxberg: Canadian CEO involved in oil sands Adnan al-Janabi: Business & political figure in post-war Iraq. Because I'm feeling lazy, I'll leave you with the list, and a photo of Janabi, above. He's the one on the right.
If crude oil isn't going to make its way across the interior of North America by pipeline, it will do so by rail. And in fact that is the recent trend. Someday soon I may work on a detailed statement of the pros and cons of these two methods of transporting the stuff. For the moment, though, I'll just collect some potentially useful links here. I'll make a related observation, though one on a higher plane of abstraction, tomorrow. Here's an article from the early days of oil pipelines, when they were considered "marvels." A 1937 issue of Popular Science. Each of the following links is a good deal more recent than that. From an oil-industry trade journal, more than a year ago. Each of the following links is a good deal more recent than that, too. Safety issues with pipelines. For the basics on TransCanada's Keystone Pipeline System, start here. For a discussion of the proposed extension, the Keystone XL, start here. For criti...
A couple of quotes from the book Greekonomics by Vicky Pryce. Speaking of the countries other than Germany that agreed to the initial deal creating the exchange rate mechanism and later the single currency, she writes, ""[T]his was a political project sold as an economic one to the electorates across Europe. In the rush to bind Germany into a union covering most of the countries in Europe, very little thought was given to whether the result might bear any resemblance to an optimal currency area." A little later, speaking specifically of Greece and why it joined, she writes: "Interestingly, when the Greek nation expressed a real desire to join the EEC and then the euro, they were in reality secretly hoping that the Brussels bureaucrats would take over and free them from the control of their politicians, who they regarded as corrupt. Educated Greeks longed for a 'technocratic' government that would move them away from a rather Soviet-style economy su...