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A short (and incomplete) history of Friday

Yesterday I was sitting at my desk, pondering…normal things that bloggers ponder…when my friend Cassie shared this link with me. If you haven’t seen the “Friday” music video, then perhaps the forecast just seems silly, but it inspired me to think about how fast the senses and connotations of words change. For most people, Friday is just the name of a day of the week, but for the moment it’s also the source of many inside jokes and references to Rebecca Black.

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This Day in History: Abolition

Today is a very important day in American history, the anniversary of when the 13th Amendment to the Constitution was passed by Congress, that which formally abolished slavery in the U.S. in 1865. The Thirteenth provides that “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” It was ratified later that year on December 6. In honor of this anniversary, we offer an excerpt from The Oxford Guide to United States Supreme Court Decisions, which provides an overview of the Civil Rights Cases.

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This Day in History: Rosetta Stone Found

This day in 1799, the Rosetta Stone was found during Napoleon Bonaparte’s Egyptian campaign about 35 miles north of Alexandria. To learn more about this famous artifact, I turned to Oxford Reference Online and discovered this entry, taken from Carol A. R. Andrews’ article “Rosetta Stone” in The Oxford Companion to Archaeology edited by Brian […]

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New Year’s Eve

Although champagne has become as de rigueur as midnight strikes – no single food epitomizes contemporary New Year’s. The menu may be luxurious caviar, or sobering hoppin’ John on New Year’s Day. Celebrations marking the inexorable march of Father Time often involve foods imbued with symbolism.

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