History, Minus The Historian Herself

Does NPR have a gender problem? A history problem?

Over the weekend, a Washington Post blog called The Lily published a very good piece about an infuriating situation involving Here & Now, the two-hour daily news and talk program that is co-produced by NPR and Boston public radio station WBUR. The injustice in the case was done against Sarah Milov, an assistant history professor at the University of Virginia.

Milov has written a book, to be published in the fall, called "The Cigarette: A Political History." The contents of the book were the subject of a 10-minute conversation on Here & Now last Thursday, although Milov was not part of the conversation. The discussion took place between Here & Now co-host Jeremy Hobson and two male historians who make up the four-person team (three men, one woman) behind the BackStory podcast, a program of Virginia Humanities.

is a regular feature on , where two of the podcast's four hosts appear every couple of weeks to talk about some of the history behind to . Hobson is with starting the regular feature.