The Scotch Plains Public Library is hosting William B. Rogers, Associate Dean, Caspersen School of Graduate Studies, Drew University who will lead our 5-part series, an adaptation of a popular class he teaches. The series will be held on Monday evenings at 7:00pm at the library. These programs are open to all. Pre-registration is required and a copy of the syllabus is available at the Reference Desk.
Monday, Oct. 3: From Jamestown to Ft. Sumter
Monday, Nov. 7: The Civil War Soldier in Combat (and Politics!)
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Monday, Jan. 9: Leaders of the Civil War
Monday, Feb. 6: The Myth of the Confederacy
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Monday, Mar. 5: The Civil War in Movies and Conclusion
Dr. Rogers describes the series,
“Most Americans have at least some knowledge of the Civil War; Lincoln and slavery, Grant and Lee, Gettysburg and Appomattox. But how much do they really know about the war, its causes, heroes and villains, and its lasting consequences? Equally as important, where do Americans get their information about the Civil War—textbooks or historical works, movies or fiction, PBS or FOX? While the majority of Americans would agree that the Civil War is the essential defining event in American history, there agreement about much of the Civil War ends, and today the war—although mostly a war of words—rages on. (In recent memory, two Republican governors have suggested that seceding from the Union now was worth considering.) In this series we will explore several of the key ongoing debates about the war in an attempt to shed some light on events that still inspire—and trouble—Americans one hundred and fifty years later.”
William Rogers has been Associate Dean of the Caspersen School of Graduate Studies at Drew University in Madison, NJ since July, 1995. Prior to that he spent over 13 years with the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities in New Jersey in a variety of capacities. Rogers earned his bachelor’s degree in political science from Hartwick College and a master’s in public administration from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University. Rogers has a master’s in political science and a doctorate in intellectual history from the Caspersen School of Graduate Studies at Drew University. He teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in 19th century American history (particularly the Civil War), the impact of war on American society, and Irish/Irish-American history and literature.
His publications include “The Great Hunger: Act of God or Acts of Man,” in Ireland’s Great Hunger: Silence, Memory and Commemoration, “We Are All Together Now,” Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison and The Prophetic Tradition, (1995); “Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, and the Prophetic Tradition in Nineteenth Century America,” in Let Justice Roll, (1996); “Thomas Jefferson,” in the Encyclopedia of Religion and Politics, (1998); and several contributions to the Encyclopedia of World War II in the Pacific (2000). He has presented numerous papers on topics such as “Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and the Press”; “The Catholic Response to the New Science of the 19th Century”; “Abraham Lincoln and Prophetic Politics”; and “The Literature of the Civil War.” He is currently working with Christine Kinealy on the development of Irish-American identity in the 19th century. His lifetime project is a book that explores American history, using his family–Irish, Dutch and Native American–as the unifying focus.
Read Dr. Rogers’ complete profile at: http://www.users.drew.edu/wrogers/resume.html
For more information, please visit www.scotlib.org, call 908-322-5007 or email library@scotlib.org
