Hidden in Plain Sight: Family Secrets and American History
A Schlesinger Library Event
The theme of this discussion is the not-quite-secret histories of American families—stories hidden in plain sight that, once revealed, require us to rethink the broader outlines of American history.
How do we know what we know? What can't we know, ever? What should and shouldn't be preserved?
Gail Lumet Buckley '59 (18:19), author, The Black Calhouns: From Civil War to Civil Rights with One African American Family (Atlantic Monthly Press, 2016)
Alice Echols (31:44), author, Shortfall: Family Secrets, Financial Collapse, and a Hidden History of American Banking (The New Press, 2017)
Susan Faludi '81, RI '09 (41:59), author, In the Darkroom (Metropolitan Books, 2016)
Alex Wagner (53:10), author, Futureface: A Family Mystery, an Epic Quest, and the Secret to Belonging (One World, forthcoming)
Moderated by Annette Gordon-Reed JD '84, RI '16, Charles Warren Professor of American Legal History, Harvard Law School, and professor of history, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Lizabeth Cohen, dean, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and Howard Mumford Jones Professor of American Studies, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Jane Kamensky (4:53), Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Director, Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute, and professor of history, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences
PANEL DISCUSSION (1:01:35)
AUDIENCE Q&A (1:11:13)