This fall the American Social History Project’s latest Web resource, Picturing United States History: An Interactive Resource for Teaching with Visual Evidence, will host two online forums on teaching with visual evidence. The October 2009 forum on the West will be guest-moderated by Professor Catherine Lavender of the College of Staten Island at the City University of New York; the November 2009 forum on the Civil War will be guest-moderated by Professor Alice Fahs of the University of California-Irvine.

Representing a unique collaboration between historians and art historians, Picturing U.S. History is based on the belief that visual materials are vital to understanding the American past. Visitors to the website will find Web-based guides, essays, case studies, classroom activities, and online forums to assist high school teachers and college instructors to incorporate visual evidence into their classroom practice. The website supplements other U.S. history resources with visual materials, analysis, and activities that allow students to engage with the process of interpretation in a more robust fashion than through text alone.

The West and Civil War forums are the latest in our series of online conversations about the visualization of the past. To sign-up for the Picturing U.S. History forums, go to: Forums.

Picturing U.S. History is supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities as part of its We, The People initiative.