Virtual AHA is a series of online opportunities to bring together communities of historians, build professional relationships, discuss scholarship, and engage in professional and career development. A service to our members as they navigate the current emergency, Virtual AHA provides a forum for discussing common issues, building research networks, and broadening and maintaining our professional community in dire circumstances. It also provides resources for online teaching and other professional and career development. We are creating various kinds of content to help historians connect, while helping us learn more about what our members want and need.

Virtual AHA

Virtual AHA will run through June 2021. Virtual AHA incorporates the AHA Colloquium, our name for content drawn from the canceled 2021 annual meeting. It also includes an online teaching forum, career development workshops, a series of History Behind the Headlines webinars, National History Center programming, and more. These programs are free, and AHA membership is not required to register. Many of the webinars will be available for later viewing on the AHA's YouTube channel.

See historians.org/VirtualAHA for details. Download the Virtual AHA app at guidebook.com/g/virtualaha for the latest schedule updates and links.

Virtual Exhibit Hall

The AHA Virtual Exhibit Hall will be available online through June 2021. The Virtual Exhibit Hall provides an opportunity to learn about the latest historical scholarship, take advantage of publisher discounts, and network with editors and press staff. If you normally look forward to the exhibits at the annual meeting, the Virtual Exhibit Hall offers a similar experience from the comfort of your home. Best of all, no name badge is necessary: the Exhibit Hall is free and open to the public. Check it out at historians.org/ExhibitHall.

Programming Content Streams

• AHA Colloquium: Bringing together communities of historians who ordinarily meet face-to-face at our annual meeting through web-based programming. Visit historians.org/Colloquium for a full list of staff- and participant-produced content.
• History Behind the Headlines: Featuring prominent historians discussing the histories behind current events and the importance of history and historical thinking to public policy and culture.
• Online Teaching Forum: Helping historians plan for teaching in online and hybrid environments.
• Virtual Career Development: Emphasizing career exploration and skill development for graduate students and early career historians.
• Virtual Seminars for Department Chairs: Supporting department chairs through the transitions and uncertainties resulting from COVID-19. Webinars will be small-group discussions (capped at 10 participants) and facilitated by an experienced department chair.
• National History Center Congressional Briefings: Briefings by leading historians on past events and policies that shape the issues facing Congress today.
• Washington History Seminar: Facilitating understanding of contemporary affairs in light of historical knowledge from a variety of perspectives. A joint venture of the National History Center of the AHA and the History and Public Policy Program of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

Upcoming Events

• February 9: AHA Colloquium—Shifting How History Is Taught: A Dialogue to Inspire Instructional Innovation in Secondary and Higher Education
• February 11: AHA Colloquium—Teaching Premodern Women and Gender
• February 12: AHA Colloquium—Affective Internationalism: Inserting Emotion into Histories of International Governance
• February 16: AHA Colloquium—Future Directions in Research and Training for Digital History
• February 18: AHA Colloquium—History Gateways: What I'm Doing Differently in My History Introductory Course
• February 19: Career Development—How to Think and Talk about Your Transferable Skills: A Professional Development Workshop with Derek Attig
• February 23: AHA Colloquium—"Our Country Is Full": Roots and Consequences of America's 1921 Immigration Act 100 Years Later
• February 25: AHA Colloquium—Thinking Catastrophe Times

In Case You Missed It

The following recordings are available on the AHA’s YouTube channel:

Online Teaching Forum

• Teaching History This Fall: Strategies and Tools for Learning and Equity
• Dual and Concurrent Enrollment in History: Strengthening Programs and Learning
• History Gateways: "Many Thousands Failed" in 2020: A Conversation with Drew Koch
• History TAs in the Time of COVID
• Deep Thoughts: Metacognition and Teaching History
• The Role of Higher Ed in AP History Courses and Exams

Career Development

• What Is Grad School Really Like?
• Careers for Historians in the Tech Industry
• Making the Most of Your Postdoc

AHA Colloquium

• Doing Research During COVID-19
• The Crisis of Democracy
• History and Historians in Response to COVID-19 (three-event series): Plagues Past and Present; Containing Contagion; Infection and Inequality

History Behind the Headlines

• Presidential Debates in Historical Perspective
• History Behind the Headlines: Historians Reflect on the 2020 Election

Washington History Seminar

• Recordings are available on the National History Center’s YouTube channel.

Further Information about the AHA Colloquium for Those Accepted for the 2021 Program

People originally scheduled to be on the 2021 program will have a variety of options for sharing their work. We are looking forward to working with participants on creative new ways to share their work. Keep an eye on historians.org/VirtualAHA for regular updates. 

A PDF program, documenting all sessions accepted by the AHA Program Committee and the affiliated societies, was posted on the AHA website in early November so that participants can validate their expected participation for their CVs. Anyone who was expecting to deliver a prepared presentation will have the opportunity to post written remarks on the AHA website.