Seth Rockman

@sethrockman

Historian at Brown University: Author of _Plantation Goods: A Material History of American Slavery_ Nov. 2024,

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Seth Rockman@sethrockman· 8d

Scenes from an upcoming municipal election in Berlin

Campaign sign saying "Les Washington. More Germany" and showing a German dog on an American leash

Campaign poster reading Fight fascism, Do not copy

Campaing poster reading "Elementary School without Cell phones"

Ripped up and discarded campaign poster for candidate from AfD party

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jul 6

An activity that still brings me a lot of happiness

stacks of quarters nickels dimes and pennies

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jun 29

Attended a beautiful bat mitzvah on Saturday, which included a reading of Emma Lazarus's New Colossus (1883). It felt like a radical act. It shouldn't be. This is our superpower. This is the secret sauce. This is what makes America great.

The New Colossus
BY EMMA LAZARUS
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jun 20

These 1973 USPS stamps make me happy.

sheet of 1973 US Postal Service "Postal People" stamps

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jun 8

Perhaps a parade of p. 562 annotations would be a fitting tribute to Gordon. One approach, apparently, was just to underline everything.

page 562 of Gordon Wood's Creation of the American Republic.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jun 5

Respect to the USPS for putting out a sheet of Revolutionary "founders" that aligns with the direction of the last several decades of scholarly research.

Sheet of US Postal Service stamps commemorating the Semiquincentennial

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jun 3

Not improving morale, it turns out.

Image from Brown University daily email announcements, indicating more security cameras on campus and more AI tools.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· May 2

and here is the visual evidence...

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· May 2

Look what's here! Just in time to order for your fall classes! It's the affordable paperback version of *Plantation Goods* from @uchicagopress.bsky.social

A stack of 5 copies of the paperback version of Plantation Goods by Seth Rockman

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Apr 7

Does anyone know anything about how these pop-up campus events promoting Gemini AI work? As in, who pays what to whom? Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if Brown paid Google to come to campus today to hand out free water bottles and tell students how to cheat on their finals and make revenge porn.

Pop-up marketing event for Googe Gemini AI on the Brown University campus.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Apr 6

How about this: Get OFF my campus!

Banner for Gemini on campus event on athletic fields at Brown University

Kiosks for Gemini on campus event on Brown University campus

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Apr 1

The fateful day has arrived!

A jar of gefilte fish on a kitchen counter

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Dec 21

World’s worst Hanukkah gelt

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Dec 16

Current view, leaving me so profoundly sad. My students know how much I love teaching at Brown, and my heart aches for them and for our whole community.

Brown university main green, snowy and abandoned

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Nov 15

I'd forgotten about that piece! Thanks for finding it. Weird that is stops mid-sentence. Here's the rest:

Maryland. Anyone unable to pay could be auctioned into temporary slavery to cover the costs. It is not clear the 1832 law was enforced in Baltimore, but it surely hung over the heads of many working-class families.

Today, the comparison of illegal immigration to slavery is not uncommon. Representative James Sensenbrenner, Congress’s most outspoken opponent of illegal immigration, has labeled companies like Baltimore’s Jones Industrial Network the “21st-century slave masters.” The analogy is dubious, unless one believes that Africans willingly endured the Middle Passage in search of better lives in America. Nor can Sensenbrenner don the mantle of abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison, who also fought discrimination against African Americans. Instead, Sensenbrenner’s historical forbearers were those nineteenth-century politicians who claimed that slaves and free blacks took jobs away from white people.

No more evidence supported this argument in the years before the Civil War than it does now among those who accuse immigrants of stealing “American jobs.” Such incendiary rhetoric sparked mob violence against Frederick Douglass when he worked in Baltimore’s shipyards, and so too has it jeopardized the lives and livelihoods of immigrant families today. When we consider the longer history of “illegal” labor in Baltimore, we should consider how earlier workers defied such an ugly classification to make better lives for future generations.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Nov 11

Wonderful conversation with @kawulf.bsky.social and Leslie Harris at @brownhist.bsky.social about Lineage, Karin’s wonderful new @oxfordunipress.bsky.social book!

Karin Wulf talking with Leslie Harris at a table with microphones

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Nov 4

Leaving no option unexplored as Spring semester pre-registration arrives...

Still from the recent Saturday Night Live sketch about George Washington, with Washington saying "And we shall call the class The American Revolution and it shall meet Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10:30am"

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Oct 23

Very pleased to have found a physical copy.

Cover of the Nov 2025 issue of the Atlantic on the American revolution

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Oct 22

And November 13 at Amherst College

Poster for Rockman November 13 talk at Amherst, picture of Rockman and Plantation Goods cover

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Oct 22

And this week, Miami! The one in Florida.

Flier for Rockman talk at Florida International U on Thursday Oct 23rd. Picture of Rockman and book jacket for Plantation goods.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Oct 14

There is a great event coming this Saturday, courtesy of @brownhist.bsky.social There are lots of reasons to study History. Here are 3.

Poster for Brown University event Saturday October 18 called "What Can't you do with a History Concentration!" featuring Sam Adler-Bell, Rachael Bedard, and Rebecca Qiu

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Oct 4

don't know what you are talking about...

statue of Dorr that now stands in the RI State capitol

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Oct 4

Whose day just got brightened by the arrival of this new volume? Mine!!! Indeed there is generally too little Dorr content on this app.

Rockman holding book entitled The Selected Writings of Thomas Wilson Dorr

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Sep 19

"Northern Profits and Southern Plantations: Telling the Truth about Harvard Slavery"-- next week's talk at Columbia by Richard Cellini. Consider going...

Poster announcing Sept 23 talk by Richard Cellini at Columbia University with image of enslaved workers harvesting sugar cane,

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Sep 18

A few weeks from now, I'll be crossing state lines to make a presentation about Plantation Goods at the Carpenter Museum in Rehoboth, Massachusetts. It is free and open to the public.

Poster with QR code announcing Seth Rockman talk on October 9, 630 at the Carpenter Museum in Rehoboth, Massachusetts.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Aug 14

To be specific...

Image of a container ship with the words "history of capitalism" spelled out on the containers, and "M-W-F 10:00-10:50, Stephen Robert Hall 280 BrooK St., room 101, Professor Seth Rockman" spelled on the hull.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Aug 14

Preparing for the fall semester...

Using the "Is this butterfly" meme to ask whether current US economic policy is or isn't capitalism.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jul 24

New experience: a day of archival research followed by a swim in the ocean! Thanks URI special collections.. and Rhode Island more generally!

Beach view from east matunuck state beach

Archival cypher book from early 1800s featuring some drawings

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· Jun 16

Not a book to read if chicken nuggets play a large role in your diet. Alternatively, a very important book to read if you're interested in learning more about the contemporary meatpacking industry, the horrors of covid-era factory conditions, and the resilience of working people.

Cover of Alice Driver's Life and Death of the American Worker book.

Seth Rockman@sethrockman· May 30

Got to celebrate Craig Friend's new book *Becoming Lunsford Lane* at @amantiquarian.bsky.social. Congratulations to Craig, of course, as well as @dgershenowitz.bsky.social and @uncpress.bsky.social