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Kristen de Groot
News Officer
krisde@upenn.edu
History
Reflections on suffrage: The 19th Amendment at 100
Reflections on suffrage: The 19th Amendment at 100
Penn Today reached out to experts from centers and schools across the University to look at suffrage through the lens of history, this election, and the fight yet to come.
Maps, pandemics, and reckoning with history
Maps, pandemics, and reckoning with history
Geospatial data has long been an important tool for scientists and scholars, but now, as society grapples with both coronavirus and a history of systemic racism, can maps help chart a path toward a brighter future?
Lessons from Hiroshima, 75 years later
Lessons from Hiroshima, 75 years later
Penn Today asks scholars and experts to share their thoughts on the 75th anniversary of America’s atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
Gouverneur Morris: A Founder, disabled American
Gouverneur Morris: A Founder, disabled American
Best known for writing the “We the People” preamble to the Constitution, Gouverneur Morris also lived with painful disabilities. History doctoral candidate Jennifer Reiss looks at him through this underexplored lens.
What happens to a dream deferred? 60-Second Lectures on racial injustice
What happens to a dream deferred? 60-Second Lectures on racial injustice
In an effort to amplify the messages of the recent protests against racist violence, Penn Arts & Sciences created a special series: What Happens to a Dream Deferred? 60-Second Lectures on Racial Injustice.
Brazil’s coronavirus crisis
Brazil’s coronavirus crisis
Brazil has become one of the world’s deadliest hotspots for the novel coronavirus, second only to the United States in deaths and infections. Melissa Teixeira, a historian of modern Brazil, shares her thoughts on the nation’s response and challenges it faces in battling the virus.
Newly digitized Marian Anderson collection now accessible online
Newly digitized Marian Anderson collection now accessible online
Penn Libraries has completed digitization of more than 2,500 items from its Marian Anderson collection, now available for public view on a new website.
Cholera vs. flu: Philadelphia’s historical epidemic successes and failures
Cholera vs. flu: Philadelphia’s historical epidemic successes and failures
Philadelphia’s response to the 1918 influenza might be the poster child of how not to handle an epidemic. Timothy Kent Holliday makes the case that the city was well equipped for outbreaks decades and even centuries earlier.
Children’s literature as ‘seed work’
Children’s literature as ‘seed work’
Penn GSE’s Ebony Elizabeth Thomas discusses the importance of more diverse books for kids and the challenges that continue to stifle early anti-racist learning. She also shares a curated list of recommended books for youth catered to this particular moment.
What the 1968 Kerner Commission can teach us
What the 1968 Kerner Commission can teach us
Criminologist and statistician Richard Berk, who worked on the report as a graduate student, explains the systemic racism and poverty found to underlie violent unrest in the 1960s and where COVID-19 and the economy fit today.
Media Contact
In the News
Philadelphia Inquirer
How Philly’s summer of protests revitalized the affordable housing movement
Mary Frances Berry of the School of Arts & Sciences said racial justice movements have historically been catalyzed by police brutality, then expanded to address economic equality.
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Vice
As China cracks down, Hong Kongers start digitally preserving their city
Randall Mason of the Stuart Weitzman School of Design commented on efforts to create a digital archive of Hong Kong’s culture. “Preservation is always a reflection of contemporary culture,” he said. “We have to get comfortable with the fact that if we want to communicate the past, it’s a creative process and not just a preservation process. It would be crazy not to use these digital tools.”
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KYW Newsradio (Philadelphia)
Many Americans opposed the suffrage movement—even women
Kathy Peiss of the School of Arts & Sciences spoke about women who opposed the suffrage movement. “The anti-suffragists were opposed to the idea of women having the right to vote largely because they saw it as a violation of women’s true gender nature—that they were mothers and wives—and that it might distract them from not only the duties of the home, but also their sense of women’s privileges to be in the home,” she said.
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Science
How atomic bomb survivors have transformed our understanding of radiation’s impacts
A book by Susan Lindee of the School of Arts & Sciences was cited regarding the effects of the 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
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USA Today
Amid COVID-19, church killings anniversary, Charleston Black history museum keeps eye on 2022 opening
Howard Stevenson of the Graduate School of Education said a comprehensive history education can help people “navigate racism today” and better understand intergenerational trauma.
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CNN
The art world is trying to protect artwork amid civil unrest and support community unity
George Wheeler of the Stuart Weitzman School of Design spoke about the preservation of public monuments amid protests and uprisings.
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