There’s always a little bit of grump in the historian. Sometimes it’s because they feel under-utilized and under-appreciated. Sometimes it’s because they feel like nobody wants to remember that one historical anecdote they’re certain would right the wrongs of the present. Sometimes it’s because they spend a vast amount of their time worrying about the latest menagerie of Chicago-Style reference updates, while trying to get their citation software caught up before the next publication editor comes calling.
And sometimes it’s because they’re just tired of feeling like the world is one gigantic clap-trap of chaos, and all they get to do is thumb their nose at eternity with a slightly melancholic whisper of, “I told you so…”
Well, here is the antidote for this particular grumpy historian. This blog is my attempt to remain sane while studying, reading and compiling my research. I hope it has some academic value, of course, but in the long run it’s a place that will let my scholarly side have a little more fun. Hopefully it will allow me to explore the random irritations which surface while wandering through archives, the dusty academic landscape and an ever metastasizing world of history as it intertwines with the present.
Short of all that, if you’re just the grumpy type, maybe you’ll find some value in being able to smile at the snark. I anticipate there being plenty of that to go around.
Basic bio:
Name: Greg Howell
Occupation: Third-year Doctoral student in History, focusing on History of the Christian Church and related topics
Attending: Regent University in Virginia Beach, VA
Historical Interests: Second Great Awakening, Modern Church, Practical Theology (both Qualitative and Quantitative methods), Influenza Pandemic of 1919, Seventh-day Adventist Church History, History of Science (usually Bio’s of the scientists themselves), Marginalia and pretty much any other historical ephemera that catches my fancy.
Aspirations: To not let my dissertation find its way to the dusty research shelf, never to see the light of day again, to still remember the names and birth-dates of my children by the end of my program, to make it big and be on the History Channel or something, someday.