Dr. Susan A. Crane: Professor, Modern European History
Wednesday, May 6, 2026, 3:00-4:00 pm, Koffler Great Room at ASA and zoom
The past is what happened. History is what we choose to remember and write about the past. In this talk by Dr. Susan A. Crane, we will consider what qualifies as memorable and what gets lost or erased, by looking carefully at something which usually doesn’t make it into the historical record: Nothing. “Nothing” can be remembered. It happens all the time and certainly happened in the past. By paying attention to some familiar, colloquial expressions that bring up Nothing, we will see how Nothing has mattered to memory: for instance, how “Nothing has changed,” and “Nothing is the way it was,” and “Nothing happened.” What are the implications of this for the study of history and for memories that can be deployed for social justice?
May 6: How a Historian Remembers Nothing