The Historian’s Self-Reflection and American Racism

In March 1997 a distinguished historian, Professor Joel Williamson of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, wrote a self-reflective essay in the Journal of American History ( JAH) in which he examined why he, as a born and bred Southerner, could not see and in fact denied and obviated the existence of lynching in American history. The JAH, with an exemplary psychodynamic introduction by editor David Thelen, persuaded six referees, all distinguished scholars, four white and two African American, to waive their strict confidentiality and publish their reviews. The author published the paper as submitted, with no revisions. This unique view of the workings of the academic publication review process reveals a sharp clash in evaluation between the referees based on race and stance toward the self-reflective intent of the author.