Karin Wulf's Avatar

Karin Wulf

@kawulf.bsky.social

Historian of #VastEarlyAmerica, gender, family & politics | Director & Librarian @ JCBLibrary | History Prof @ Brown U #LineageTheBook OUP July, 2025 | On some other platforms and also @ karinwulf.com | Opinions here just mine.

14,017 Followers  |  2,638 Following  |  11,699 Posts  |  Joined: 16.08.2023
Posts Following

Posts by Karin Wulf (@kawulf.bsky.social)

Preview
What’s in the Name (Omohundro)? - OIEAHC by Karin Wulf Over the years people have wondered about the name “Omohundro.”  Many have asked about the derivation of the name itself and about why the OI carries the […]

Always interested in E Van Lew! There’s a fascinating #HATM ( well I thought so) Omohundro link that’s also a good lesson for women’s history month! oieahc.wm.edu/publications...

02.03.2026 01:06 — 👍 4    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0
Silhouette of a woman with an enormous updo hairdo, long 18th century gown, and an absurd hat perched atop.

Silhouette of a woman with an enormous updo hairdo, long 18th century gown, and an absurd hat perched atop.

How can you be talking about HISTORY with everything that's going on. 18th century history? Women's history? Waves hands.

Friends, it is precisely because of everything that's going on that we need to talk about history much, much more.

01.03.2026 12:52 — 👍 159    🔁 39    💬 3    📌 0
Fashionable regency era as imagined on tv, Eloise Bridgerton sitting in a drawing room with a quizzical look. Caption: "you read Mary Wollstonecraft?"

Fashionable regency era as imagined on tv, Eloise Bridgerton sitting in a drawing room with a quizzical look. Caption: "you read Mary Wollstonecraft?"

The best moment in Bridgeton season 4.

01.03.2026 14:04 — 👍 40    🔁 2    💬 1    📌 0

I look forward to checking this out. Absolutely more people should read more about more women.

But even more so, we should be asking WHY these stories-- far from unknown -- are still considered "hidden." Less discourse about uncovering please and more about who and why the hiding happens.

01.03.2026 13:53 — 👍 20    🔁 3    💬 1    📌 0

Yes exactly. And what it doesn't do-- just writing notes for a panel this morning where this is a feature of my comments!-- is ask us WHY we think or HOW we think these things are "hidden." The "uncovered" discourse leaves the power of how we make "history" conveniently to the side.

01.03.2026 13:52 — 👍 13    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

I hope the footnotes are awesome/ fulsome! Full of the scholars and writers who have been researching, writing, lifting these early American women's histories for a long time.

Because it is true that despite that work, too few people know enough history --and how "history" comes to us as it does.

01.03.2026 13:46 — 👍 28    🔁 9    💬 2    📌 0

Mercy Otis Warren.

I despair.

01.03.2026 13:41 — 👍 10    🔁 0    💬 1    📌 0
Preview
A Short History of the High Roll - Commonplace "In 1767 the author of a letter to the editor of the New York Journal bemoaned the fashion that led women to double the size of their heads with the use of pomatum, artificial pads, and hair procured ...

A good accessible primer for the politics of fashion in the revolution is (now Professor) Kate Haulman's "Short History of the High Roll."

That image ⬇️ is from the sketchbook of John Andre, the most famous British officer executed in the revolution.

commonplace.online/article/a-sh...

01.03.2026 12:52 — 👍 13    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Today marks the first day of Women's History Month; yesterday was the last day of Black History Month.

Every day is for women's history and Black history and Black women's history.

Because these are not histories that are separate from histories of war and economy.

01.03.2026 12:52 — 👍 87    🔁 29    💬 1    📌 0
Two engraved images of 18th century women with wild elaborate hairstyles -- both with military encampments within.  A cannon poking out of one, firing. A satire on the British losses early in the revolutionary war.

Two engraved images of 18th century women with wild elaborate hairstyles -- both with military encampments within. A cannon poking out of one, firing. A satire on the British losses early in the revolutionary war.

It's not Bridgerton. Yes, American women wore wild high hair, too. Yes, it absolutely also had to do with status, consumption -- and politics.

Debating hair was debating power-- and always to sneer at women, whose hold on power was always conditional.

Image ⬇️ fr @jcblibrary.bsky.social

01.03.2026 12:52 — 👍 11    🔁 0    💬 1    📌 1

What's happening out there is always predicated on an idea about the past, what actions are justified, whose paths are smoothed, and why.

Oh, that's Lucy (Mrs. Henry) Knox, wife of one of George Washington's top generals. Just in the hallway @ Mass Historical.

01.03.2026 12:52 — 👍 12    🔁 0    💬 2    📌 0
Silhouette of a woman with an enormous updo hairdo, long 18th century gown, and an absurd hat perched atop.

Silhouette of a woman with an enormous updo hairdo, long 18th century gown, and an absurd hat perched atop.

How can you be talking about HISTORY with everything that's going on. 18th century history? Women's history? Waves hands.

Friends, it is precisely because of everything that's going on that we need to talk about history much, much more.

01.03.2026 12:52 — 👍 159    🔁 39    💬 3    📌 0

"I thank you most sincerely for your polite notice of me, in the elegant Lines you enclosed; and however undeserving I may be of such encomium and panegyrick, the style and manner exhibit a striking proof of your great poetical Talents."
- George Washington to Phillis Wheatley, 28 February 1776

28.02.2026 19:00 — 👍 14    🔁 3    💬 1    📌 1
A chalkboard sign “my fellow Americans we are and always will be a nation of immigrants. We were strangers once too. Barack Obama soup Italian wedding.”

A chalkboard sign “my fellow Americans we are and always will be a nation of immigrants. We were strangers once too. Barack Obama soup Italian wedding.”

If you go through the best Amtrak station (not for building aesthetics) on a weekday you get this too.

Though I usually get the excellent grilled cheese rather than soup of the day.

28.02.2026 19:04 — 👍 24    🔁 2    💬 0    📌 0
Image of an 18th century city scene, with info about "Liberty for All?  Women in the Age of the Revolutions" and info also about the opening plenary with Jennifer Morgan and Karin Wulf.

Image of an 18th century city scene, with info about "Liberty for All? Women in the Age of the Revolutions" and info also about the opening plenary with Jennifer Morgan and Karin Wulf.

Amidst all, will be glad to be in conversation with my brilliant friend Jennifer Morgan tomorrow and in company with a stunning group of historians @nyhistory.bsky.social for the Max conference on women's history-- a subject we need much, much more of. www.nyhistory.org/programs/lib...

28.02.2026 16:13 — 👍 13    🔁 5    💬 0    📌 0
"I think that it needs to be known that the youth cares about this," said Maya,who walked out of her AP U.S. History class. "We don't think that any of this is okay, and we do not give our consent to have this kind of government.:

"I think that it needs to be known that the youth cares about this," said Maya,who walked out of her AP U.S. History class. "We don't think that any of this is okay, and we do not give our consent to have this kind of government.:

Sometimes walking out of your history class is the best way to demonstrate that you learned something in your history class.
wapo.st/4aF0iqG

28.02.2026 04:23 — 👍 193    🔁 33    💬 5    📌 1

It was a real privilege to do a deep dive into the history of Indigenous slavery, through a new digital archive called @natboundunbound.bsky.social. It felt like a really important topic to me, and a really important project. Thank you for reading and sharing!

27.02.2026 23:32 — 👍 11    🔁 5    💬 1    📌 0

Looks and sounds amazing. Perfect Friday night fare.

27.02.2026 23:32 — 👍 2    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

I have no idea what today's misdirected fury is about. Just noting that while we are all human thus imperfect there are so few among us who read, think, and write with integrity.

This is a @jamellebouie.net appreciation post.

27.02.2026 23:31 — 👍 33    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 1

Or why pace WSJ, more Americans are expatriating. Would be sad if it wasn't so enraging.

27.02.2026 23:28 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

1/ @marthasjones.bsky.social and @katemasur.bsky.social have drafted a seminal brief: (a) that centers Black American beliefs on birthright citizenship and (b) uses a set of primary sources, such as speeches and Colored Conventions, fought for (and won) broad birthright citizenship for everyone.

27.02.2026 12:55 — 👍 79    🔁 37    💬 1    📌 2

Marvelous!!

27.02.2026 13:58 — 👍 2    🔁 0    💬 1    📌 0

I am very glad to see federal Indian law scholars @bethanyberger.bsky.social and Greg Ablavsky filing a brief because, man, I've seen been some ahistorical takes on what "subject to the jurisdiction" means for Native Americans & why the provision is there.

Here's their brief: https://

27.02.2026 10:59 — 👍 80    🔁 31    💬 0    📌 2

Here’s the link to Martha Jones and Kate Masur’s powerful amicus brief which leaves no doubt: Trump’s assault on birthright citizenship is unconstitutional

www.brennancenter.org/media/15301/...

27.02.2026 11:57 — 👍 32    🔁 23    💬 1    📌 0

Congrats, very much look forward to reading!!

27.02.2026 11:21 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Buddy, you're just inviting a conversation. 😄

27.02.2026 11:17 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

I mean, it's odd for many reasons not least the 1754 unite against the French origins. The Join or Die image was used in the revolution, Civil War (both sides) and since in all kinds of political contexts.

Eg without its original context. New England just one big united already colony there.

27.02.2026 11:12 — 👍 11    🔁 4    💬 1    📌 1
Post image

Snake-in-parts sculpture for the US 250th?

Did not know about plans for this at Independence National Park until I read JSchuessler's in NYT yesterday mentioning it. Would love to know the background on this from the NPS. Will children climb on it, pose in front of a state's "segment?!"

27.02.2026 11:08 — 👍 4    🔁 0    💬 2    📌 1

#VernacularGenealogy! 🤩

27.02.2026 02:13 — 👍 12    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0

nooooooooo

26.02.2026 20:27 — 👍 3    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0