Conference Film
November 14–15, 2014, Dudley Davis Center, University of Vermont
The Civil War casts a long shadow in the United States. As Robert Penn Warren put it in his classic 1961 book, The Legacy of the Civil War, “many clear and objective facts about America are best understood in reference to the Civil War.” VHC’s 2014 fall conference, presented in collaboration with the Vermont Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission, explored the influence that the War had and continues to have on literature, visual art, race, memory, and politics. Taking place five months before the end of the sesquicentennial of the Civil War, the conference sought to identify lessons vital to American democracy that still can be learned from the War and its aftermath.