Joseph M. Adelman
@jmadelman.bsky.social
Historian of politics, business, media in early America. Author of Revolutionary Networks. He/him. See https://josephadelman.com for more.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
I remember asking @katecarp.bsky.social if @draftingthepast.bsky.social was a confessional space...I think it is, and I was giddy to get to talk with Kate about the joy of writing history -- and my tremendous good fortune to get to do it. draftingthepast.com/podcast-epis...
Episode 76: Karin Wulf Keeps Her Brain Humming Along - Drafting the Past
In this episode, Kate is joined by Karin Wulf, the director and librarian of the John Carter Brown Library, to discuss her new book, Lineage, and her research and writing process.
draftingthepast.com
November 25, 2025 at 11:20 AM
I remember asking @katecarp.bsky.social if @draftingthepast.bsky.social was a confessional space...I think it is, and I was giddy to get to talk with Kate about the joy of writing history -- and my tremendous good fortune to get to do it. draftingthepast.com/podcast-epis...
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
Nearly-perfect printed and handwritten text recognition is the most consequential technical contribution to the study of human culture of the last fifteen years, and it's not even close.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
New issue of my newsletter: "The Writing Is on the Wall for Handwriting Recognition" — One of the hardest problems in digital humanities has finally been solved, and it's a good use of AI newsletter.dancohen.org/archive/the-...
The Writing Is on the Wall for Handwriting Recognition
One of the hardest problems in digital humanities has finally been solved
newsletter.dancohen.org
November 25, 2025 at 6:14 PM
Nearly-perfect printed and handwritten text recognition is the most consequential technical contribution to the study of human culture of the last fifteen years, and it's not even close.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
An eerie quiet descends on a college campus on the Tuesday of Thanksgiving week.
November 25, 2025 at 4:04 PM
An eerie quiet descends on a college campus on the Tuesday of Thanksgiving week.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
Today is the anniversary of the British evacuating New York City after the end of the Revolutionary War. Here's how I learned about it: the piece that introduced me to the terrific work of @bencarp.bsky.social
Evacuation Day: Marking the End of the Revolutionary War
We know how to honor the image of soldiers charging forward, but we often forget to cheer the backs of troops as they peaceably depart.
werehistory.org
November 25, 2025 at 6:55 AM
Today is the anniversary of the British evacuating New York City after the end of the Revolutionary War. Here's how I learned about it: the piece that introduced me to the terrific work of @bencarp.bsky.social
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
Google at its peak was basically the best information retrieval system in human history and they and every competitor decided going from there to “you didn’t want answers you wanted half-assed auto-complete 80%-wrong hallucinations” in a few years was the right idea
November 25, 2025 at 1:57 AM
Google at its peak was basically the best information retrieval system in human history and they and every competitor decided going from there to “you didn’t want answers you wanted half-assed auto-complete 80%-wrong hallucinations” in a few years was the right idea
Heading out on the road today for #Thanksgiving travel? Take Ben Franklin’s World with you!
Here are some themed episodes for your en-route listening, starting with our amazing two-part series, The World of the Wampanoag. #BFW #VastEarlyAmerica @lizcovart.bsky.social
Here are some themed episodes for your en-route listening, starting with our amazing two-part series, The World of the Wampanoag. #BFW #VastEarlyAmerica @lizcovart.bsky.social
Episode 290: The World of the Wampanoag, Part 1: Before 1620
We’ll explore the World of the Wampanoag before and after 1620, a year that saw approximately 100 English colonists enter the Wampanoags’ world.
benfranklinsworld.com
November 25, 2025 at 12:44 PM
Heading out on the road today for #Thanksgiving travel? Take Ben Franklin’s World with you!
Here are some themed episodes for your en-route listening, starting with our amazing two-part series, The World of the Wampanoag. #BFW #VastEarlyAmerica @lizcovart.bsky.social
Here are some themed episodes for your en-route listening, starting with our amazing two-part series, The World of the Wampanoag. #BFW #VastEarlyAmerica @lizcovart.bsky.social
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
i’m not crying you’re crying
xkcd: Fifteen Years
xkcd: Fifteen Years
Fifteen Years
xkcd.com
November 25, 2025 at 1:58 AM
i’m not crying you’re crying
xkcd: Fifteen Years
xkcd: Fifteen Years
My mom’s whole family comes to visit one year. On Wednesday night we order pizza and salad, which comes with a creamy house balsamic dressing.
Friday we serve leftovers. My aunts comment that the gravy tastes sour, but still finish their turkey and stuffing with creamy house balsamic dressing.
Friday we serve leftovers. My aunts comment that the gravy tastes sour, but still finish their turkey and stuffing with creamy house balsamic dressing.
yes, hello, I would like to place an order for everyone’s funniest stories of holiday food-related family grudges / drama / chaotic incidents / lore
I feel like we need this
I feel like we need this
November 25, 2025 at 12:55 AM
My mom’s whole family comes to visit one year. On Wednesday night we order pizza and salad, which comes with a creamy house balsamic dressing.
Friday we serve leftovers. My aunts comment that the gravy tastes sour, but still finish their turkey and stuffing with creamy house balsamic dressing.
Friday we serve leftovers. My aunts comment that the gravy tastes sour, but still finish their turkey and stuffing with creamy house balsamic dressing.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
Haven't received as many contributions as usual for this year's lists--could be many things, but one aspect is surely that our ability to get this in front of people is much diminished. If you know folks whose stuff should be on here, please suggest it! contingentmagazine.org/yearly-pub-l...
Publications by Non-Tenure-Track Historians
Since we began publishing in 2019, Contingent has published end-of-year lists of books and articles by non-tenure-track historians released in the past calendar year. To submit something for inclusion...
contingentmagazine.org
November 24, 2025 at 3:39 PM
Haven't received as many contributions as usual for this year's lists--could be many things, but one aspect is surely that our ability to get this in front of people is much diminished. If you know folks whose stuff should be on here, please suggest it! contingentmagazine.org/yearly-pub-l...
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
"Ongoing digitization and cataloging work not only serves the interests of scholars and manuscript communities—it also creates crucial, publicly-accessible provenance records that provide an increasingly robust bulwark against manuscript theft and trafficking."
hmml.org/stories/reve...
hmml.org/stories/reve...
Reversal of Fates: Access Through Photographs can be a Counterbalance
“Cultural losses continue to beset communities around the world, especially in areas subject to armed conflict...”
hmml.org
November 24, 2025 at 8:27 AM
"Ongoing digitization and cataloging work not only serves the interests of scholars and manuscript communities—it also creates crucial, publicly-accessible provenance records that provide an increasingly robust bulwark against manuscript theft and trafficking."
hmml.org/stories/reve...
hmml.org/stories/reve...
I’ve been sitting with this Gordon Wood essay for a bit. There’s much to consider as he makes the case for America as a “creedal nation” rather than an ethnicity. /1 #VastEarlyAmerica www.wsj.com/opinion/why-...
Opinion | Why America Is a ‘Creedal Nation’
The distinguished historian says the U.S. isn’t like other nations and never has been. There is no American ethnicity to back up the state.
www.wsj.com
November 24, 2025 at 11:55 AM
I’ve been sitting with this Gordon Wood essay for a bit. There’s much to consider as he makes the case for America as a “creedal nation” rather than an ethnicity. /1 #VastEarlyAmerica www.wsj.com/opinion/why-...
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
It’s blowing my mind that schools, universities, public services would run headlong into this. We spent 15 years documenting black boxes. This is a black box in a black hole!
I don't understand how anyone can watch how blatantly Grok is manipulated to answer the way ownership desires it to and then act like the other LLM chatbots couldn't possibly be similarly but less obviously compromised to produce responses in whatever way corporate interests and priorities dictate.
November 23, 2025 at 11:16 PM
It’s blowing my mind that schools, universities, public services would run headlong into this. We spent 15 years documenting black boxes. This is a black box in a black hole!
Just got out of Wicked: For Good and I gotta tell you, I did not expect the surprise twist ending where the Wizard wakes up in bed next to Suzanne Pleshette and realizes it was all a dream.
November 23, 2025 at 9:14 PM
Just got out of Wicked: For Good and I gotta tell you, I did not expect the surprise twist ending where the Wizard wakes up in bed next to Suzanne Pleshette and realizes it was all a dream.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
Really important to stress that the Crown Jewels of the US higher education system were never the Ivies or elite SLACs (other countries have equivalents of these) but the well-funded, large, cheap, and excellently staffed public state university systems bringing high quality education to the masses.
One of the bragging rights that the US ed system had in the 20th century is that we didn't have education tracks. Essentially, any kid could go to a CC or state school & major in whatever they wanted to (obviously an oversimplification). I fear this aspect of the American dream is dying.
November 23, 2025 at 5:18 PM
Really important to stress that the Crown Jewels of the US higher education system were never the Ivies or elite SLACs (other countries have equivalents of these) but the well-funded, large, cheap, and excellently staffed public state university systems bringing high quality education to the masses.
I think my state-school students deserve to learn how to think and analyze for themselves. Will my administrators agree or just tell students they should let a computer think for them?
Who invests in critical thinking and who invests in an AI chatbot to help you think will be really telling.
November 23, 2025 at 4:57 PM
I think my state-school students deserve to learn how to think and analyze for themselves. Will my administrators agree or just tell students they should let a computer think for them?
Johnny Tremain.
November 23, 2025 at 12:53 PM
Johnny Tremain.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
The irony of course is that Black Americans are probably far more likely to be descended from people who lived in North America before 1776 than white Americans are.
November 22, 2025 at 11:26 PM
The irony of course is that Black Americans are probably far more likely to be descended from people who lived in North America before 1776 than white Americans are.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
AI is the perfect bureaucratic technology in that it offers effortless on-demand simulacra of governmentality.
from government by consultant to government by consultants using generative AI.
decades of degrading government capacity to actually govern has left it open to further degradation through ai hype and perceptions it enables further cost cutting.
decades of degrading government capacity to actually govern has left it open to further degradation through ai hype and perceptions it enables further cost cutting.
Major N.L. healthcare report contains errors likely generated by A.I. – The Independent
$1.6 million Health Human Resources Plan from Deloitte cites research papers that don’t exist, making it the second major government policy paper called into question in as many months
theindependent.ca
November 22, 2025 at 10:15 PM
AI is the perfect bureaucratic technology in that it offers effortless on-demand simulacra of governmentality.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
In an interview with Stephanie Wong, Seth Rockman discusses his new book, “Plantation Goods,” and the overlooked economic ties that bound the North and South before the Civil War.
Cloth and Complicity: Seth Rockman on Plantations, Textiles, and the Art of Weaving - Public Books
“But I had found a set of instructions in the archives of one of New England's leading manufacturers of low-end woollen cloth for enslaved wearers.”
www.publicbooks.org
November 22, 2025 at 7:18 PM
In an interview with Stephanie Wong, Seth Rockman discusses his new book, “Plantation Goods,” and the overlooked economic ties that bound the North and South before the Civil War.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
The interview here is interesting. I'm saddened by some of what parents and teachers express in the intro as it echoes arguments of inevitability and pressure to be on "cutting edge."
Teachers and parents weigh benefits and risks of artificial intelligence in schools
Artificial intelligence is rapidly being integrated into many facets of life, including in America’s classrooms. As more school districts integrate AI into learning, we hear from parents and teachers ...
www.pbs.org
November 22, 2025 at 12:57 PM
The interview here is interesting. I'm saddened by some of what parents and teachers express in the intro as it echoes arguments of inevitability and pressure to be on "cutting edge."
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
Also - and yes I am going to keep harping on this - the study being alluded to specifically tested English and English education majors, 70% were in their junior or senior year (only 4% freshmen), all of them had passing grades, and they were allowed access to dictionaries and google.
... Boy, Dickens is the worst example to pick here.
"Dickens's world is too far removed from modern experience."
What, you mean the world of enormous wealth disparity, the industrialization of human life begetting generational suffering, the young forced to scavenge on the fringes of society...
"Dickens's world is too far removed from modern experience."
What, you mean the world of enormous wealth disparity, the industrialization of human life begetting generational suffering, the young forced to scavenge on the fringes of society...
November 21, 2025 at 7:55 PM
Also - and yes I am going to keep harping on this - the study being alluded to specifically tested English and English education majors, 70% were in their junior or senior year (only 4% freshmen), all of them had passing grades, and they were allowed access to dictionaries and google.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
We published our first essay 10 years ago today on @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social. It was based on a side idea I had for my dissertation that would explore news of Franklin’s death around the revolutionary Atlantic. ageofrevolutions.com/2015/11/21/f...
“Franklin is Dead”: Celebrity, Genius, and Religion in the Age of Revolutions
By Bryan A. Banks On June 11, 1790, an emotionally wrought Mirabeau took to the rostrum of the National Constituent Assembly after numerous days away suffering from ophthalmia to announce Benjamin …
ageofrevolutions.com
November 21, 2025 at 2:27 PM
We published our first essay 10 years ago today on @ageofrevolutions.bsky.social. It was based on a side idea I had for my dissertation that would explore news of Franklin’s death around the revolutionary Atlantic. ageofrevolutions.com/2015/11/21/f...
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
Problem is: Neither our work culture nor our education culture incentivizes deep learning. Instead, we're incentivized to economize--to learn only what's needed to finish the task or get the answer right on the test.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
Relying on ChatGPT to teach you about a topic leaves you with shallower knowledge than Googling and reading about it, according to new research that compared what more than 10,000 people knew after using one method or the other.
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
Shared by @gizmodo.com: buff.ly/yAAHtHq
November 21, 2025 at 4:57 PM
Problem is: Neither our work culture nor our education culture incentivizes deep learning. Instead, we're incentivized to economize--to learn only what's needed to finish the task or get the answer right on the test.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
So, people use ChatGPT, even when they know they could learn more by other means.
Reposted by Joseph M. Adelman
I was talking to a student about this during office hours! I told them their professors are outstanding in their field and they should take advantage of that and really learn from them. I think a lot of students at UAlbany don’t necessarily think about that.
Thinking a lot lately about the simple fact that college allows people to spend about 15 weeks immersed in a disciplinary conversation with an expert in that field. And what a special thing that is.
November 21, 2025 at 2:53 PM
I was talking to a student about this during office hours! I told them their professors are outstanding in their field and they should take advantage of that and really learn from them. I think a lot of students at UAlbany don’t necessarily think about that.