About
The Journal of the Civil War Era is published by UNC Press in association with the George and Ann Richards Civil War Era Center. It publishes the most creative new work on the many issues raised by slavery, the sectional crisis, war, emancipation, Reconstruction, and memory of the country’s signal conflict, while bringing fresh understanding to the struggles that defined the period, and by extension, the course of American history in the nineteenth century. A subscription to the journal comes with membership in the Society of Civil War Historians.
The journal offers a unique space where scholars across the many subfields that animate nineteenth-century history can enter into conversation with each other.
Besides offering fresh perspectives on the military, political, and legal history of the era, the journal covers such disparate subjects as slavery and antislavery, labor and capitalism, popular culture and intellectual history, expansionism and empire, and African American and women’s history. Moreover, The Journal of the Civil War Era is a venue where scholars engaged in the full range of theoretical perspectives that animate historical practice can find a home.
In addition to cutting-edge scholarship, the journal seeks to sharpen debate and engage historians, educators, and students with:
- Review essays that analyze emergent themes and map new directions in historiography.
- Book reviews by published scholars that offer critical perspectives on key works in the field and the discipline (learn more about reviewing books for the journal).
- Reviews of films, digital archive collections, websites, museum exhibitions, and interventions in other media.
- A YouTube series of talks with leading historians, discussing new scholarship in the Civil War era.
The University of North Carolina Press and the George and Ann Richards Civil War Era Center at the Pennsylvania State University launched The Journal of the Civil War Era in March 2011. William Blair, of the Pennsylvania State University, is the founding editor. Judith Giesberg, Villanova University, succeeded Blair and was editor from 2016 through 2019.
Kate Masur, Northwestern University, and Gregory P. Downs, University of California, Davis, serve as editors. Associate Editors include Megan Bever of Missouri Southern State University, book reviews; Catherine Jones of the University of California, Santa Cruz, review essays; and Robert Bland, digital media. Edward P. Green of the Pennsylvania State University is the Managing Editor. Moyra Williams Eaton of the Pennsylvania State University is the editorial assistants. The Journal of the Civil War Era has recruited an editorial board whose members span a wide range of specialties and theoretical engagements. Learn more at our Editors page.
We invite interested scholars of all fields, methods, and orientations to submit manuscripts, proposals, and the names of other scholars who might contribute to the journal. See our June 2020 YouTube video where our editors discuss the journal’s mission and offer advice on how to submit a compelling article to the journal.
Publishers should send books by USPS (preferred) to be reviewed to:
Dr. Megan Bever
Book Review editor, Journal of the Civil War Era
MSSU – Social Sciences
3950 E. Newman Rd.
Joplin, MO 64801
