An Incomplete History

An Incomplete History

By Geoffrey WestHistory
Download on the App Store

An Incomplete History episodes

  • Episode 39 - Taxes

    Death and Taxes. Is that all we can be sure of? In honor of traditional Tax Day (April 15), we present a history of taxes in the United States. Tariffs, excises, income taxes, anti-government movements, rebellions, paying for the military and infrastructure, they're all on the list of topics we cover in this week's episode.

    1 hr 11 min
  • Episode 38 - The Vietnam War

    Join us for a deep dive into the causes and effects of the United States' involvement in the Vietnam War from 1954 to 1975. Along the way we'll discuss the aftermath of WWII and French attempts at renewing their empire in Southeast Asia. We'll also talk about what Dwight Eisenhower defined as the Military Industrial Complex and how the machine of war may have prolonged US involvement in Vietnam. Finally we'll talk about some well-known but often misunderstood moments in the war like the My Lai Massacre.

     
    1 hr 10 min
  • Episode 37 - Women of the Revolution

    When people are asked to comment on the most famous figures of the American Revolution, the list is almost entirely men, with a few notable exceptions. Join us this week as we talk about the well-known women who participated and often literally fought during the American Revolution as well as some lesser-known women whose real stories are more fantastic than the myths surrounding Molly Pitcher and Betsy Ross. It's all on this week's episode!

     
    1 hr 1 min
  • Episode 36 - Margaret Sanger and Eugenics in America

    Margaret Sanger founded the organization that later became Planned Pioneer. She has been widely lauded as a staunch advocate of women's reproductive rights, but there's more to the story. Join us this week as we delve into Sanger's story as well as the simultaneous rise of eugenics. The United States in general and California pioneered the field of eugenics, and that is not necessarily a good thing! From forced sterilizations to medical experiments without the patient's consent, many of the ideas and methods emerging within the eugenics movement later found expression in the gruesome experiments and ideologies of Germany in the 1930s.

    1 hr 6 min
  • Episode 35 - Second Wave Feminism

    What is Second Wave Feminism? How does it differ from the First Wave? Join us as we do a deep dive into the ins and outs of Second Wave Feminism and its connections with Mary Wollstonecraft, Lucretia Mott, Simone de Beauvoir, and Betty Friedan. How did the Roe v Wade and Griswold v Connecticut change everything? And was the Houston Conference in 1977 really the end of the movement? Finally, how should we conceptualize the Third and Fourth Waves? Join us this week to find out!

    1 hr 9 min
  • Episode 34 - More Conspiracies

    This week we return to an often-requested topic - conspiracy theories. We discuss George Washington, QANON, COVID-19, HIV/AIDS, Henrietta Lacks, and Pearl Harbor. Why are Americans so obsessed with conspiracy theories? What happens when there is some truth to a particular theory? Join us this week to find out!

    1 hr 6 min
  • Episode 33 - Jim Crow and the Rise of Black Culture
    After a week off we return to our special series in honor of Black History Month. This time we discuss the two primary ways Black men and women have been characterized by white Americans for well over one hundred years: objects of desire and entertainment and subjects of scorn and suspicion. In the face of this stereotyping Black culture has responded, often quite opening, by exposing the white gaze and the inherent hypocrisy of Jim Crow. Along the way we discuss Ida Wells, Ma Rainey, Louis Armstrong, Jimi Hendrix, Collin Kaepernick, and Donald Glover.
    58 min
  • Episode 32 - The Rise of Abolitionism - Black History from 1776 to 1860
    Join us for Part 2 of our series for Black History Month. We discuss the nation's founding documents and the ways slavery was and was not addressed in each. We also discuss early abolitionists like Sojourner Truth and her connections to the Second Great Awakening, a period of religious revivalism, and William Lloyd Garrison. We also discuss the oppositional approaches towards ending slavery adopted by Nat Turner and Frederick Douglass. Finally, we discuss the unlikely friendship of Douglass and John Brown, the man hanged for his attack on the Federal Arsenal at Harper's Ferry.
    1 hr 12 min
  • Episode 31 - The First Africans in America - Black History to 1775
    Join us in the first of a four-part series delving into the complicated and often contentious history of African Americans. In this first part we cover the transition from indentured servitude to slavery. We also cover the emergence of the "Middle Passage" and the creation and eventual hardening of racial divisions in the British colonies, most notably Virginia. We introduce you to Estavanico the Moor, an early explorer in the Southwestern US, Antony Johnson a former slave turned slave owner who is posthumously deprived of the right to own property, and the thousands of Africans who perished in the figurative and literal death of forcibly being transported across the Atlantic in the 18th century.
    1 hr 6 min
  • Episode 30 - The 1776 Commission Report
    On January 17, 2021 as one of the last official acts of the Trump administration, the 1776 Commission Report was released. This report made an argument as to how the US education system had failed to educate the nation's youth on the "proper" history of the country. Join us as we delve into the commission's report and challenge some of its findings as well as its underlying premises.
    1 hr 7 min

About An Incomplete History

From the publisher's feed

This is a weekly podcast hosted by two history PhDs - Hilary and Geoff. Join them as they discuss and debate contemporary and historical events and seek to provide context. The pair cover history and…