My first thought for a title on this reflection was “identity economics.” I wanted the title to convey something about the interplay of the history profession’s economic structure and the way I, and maybe some circle of we, identify as historians. But then I saw that there is a technical area of economics, titled “identity economics” and made concrete in a book of the same title by George Akerlof and Rachel Kranton. Since I did not intend to engage their work, I reworked my title into something both more awkward and specific. In the past month I have been thinking Read more