His address on “Each Individual Hick makes National Politics: Populism Reconsidered” is a free, public event at 4 p.m. Thursday (April 15) in the Tupelo Room of Barnard Observatory. The Center for the Study of Southern Culture and the Department of History are co-sponsors of the event.<\/p>\n
“Dr. Postel’s work on Populism is highly topical since the present-day forces of globalization, economic depression and class divisions were also driving forces behind the late 19th century Populist movement,” said Joshua Howard, UM associate professor of history. “Also, much of the Populists’ reform efforts to remake America, such as the progressive income tax or electing U.S. senators by popular vote, are the law of the land today.”<\/p>\n
An assistant professor of history at San Francisco State University, Postel graduated from the University of California at Berkeley. He won a Frederick Jackson Turner Award and a Bancroft Prize for “The Populist Vision” (Oxford University Press, 2007).<\/p>\n
“Postel’s book breathes life into a topic on which scholarly debates were getting a bit old and predictable,” said Ted Ownby, director of the UM Center for the Study of Southern Culture. “His work suggests he’ll have a lot to say about how to do history as well as how to study his own specialty.”<\/p>\n
The goal of the University Lecture Series is to bring to campus cutting-edge scholars of interest to a wide range of students, faculty and community members.<\/p>\n