BackStory

314: People Making History: The Power and Perils of Telling History Through Individual Stories

We turn to history to make sense of the present…but how do you make sense of history? For many of us, it’s through stories -- individual tales of individual people. So on this episode of BackStory, Joanne, Ed and Brian present and discuss a particular person from their time period, someone who they think sheds much-needed light on our current moment.

BackStory is a weekly public podcast hosted by U.S. historians Ed Ayers, Brian Balogh, Nathan Connolly and Joanne Freeman. We're based in Charlottesville, Va. at Virginia Humanities.

There’s the history you had to learn, and the history you want to learn - that’s where BackStory comes in. Each week BackStory takes a topic that people are talking about and explores it through the lens of American history. Through stories, interviews, and conversations with our listeners, BackStory makes history engaging and fun.