It’s easy to get lost in the millions of messages users send through Twitter each day. Luckily, hashtags (a combination of the pound sign and text used in a tweet) are one way to sort through the din and find the topics you’re interested in reading about. Simply type the hashtag name in Twitter’s search field and you’ll get a list of all tweets that include it.

Conferences
Hashtags are a great way to connect during a scholarly conference. For example, attendees of the AHA’s recent 126th annual meeting shared thoughts on sessions, offered links to resources, and connected with each other through the general #AHA2012 hashtag, as well as more specific hashtags like #session138 (for a crowdsourcing session). Learn more in our article “Tweeting the 126th Annual Meeting.”

Community
As we noted in our previous post, “Five Ways for Historians to Use Twitter,” historians who use Twitter have been named “twitterstorians” and use the #twitterstorians hashtag to connect with each other. Katrina Gulliver keeps a running list of Twitterstorians as well as Twitterstorian-related articles on her blog, Notes from the Field.

History Hashtags
Hashtags can be made of any pound sign and text combination, and new hashtags are popping up every day. But what are some of the history-specific hashtags being used out in the Twittersphere? AHA Deputy Director Robert B. Townsend sent out a tweet last week asking for some feedback from Twitter users, and we’ve rounded up their responses, and some of our own, below.

What hashtags do you use to follow history on Twitter?

Topical

#history
#archives
#ChineseHistory: history of China
#ColdWar or #ColdWarHist: Cold War history
#cw150: Civil War sesquicentennial
#EnvHist: environmental history
#HistMed: history of medicine
#HistSci: history of science
#HistTech: history of technology
#JapaneseHistory or #JapanHistory: history of Japan
#LocalHistory: local history
#OralHistory: storytelling and oral history
#preservation: historic preservation
#PublicHistory: public history
#USIH: U.S. intellectual history

Digital History

#digitalhistory
#dh (though this hashtag brings up a lot of nonhistory-related content)
#dhdebates

Profession

#altac or #alt-ac: alternative academic careers
#BadHistory: inaccurate or questionable history
#HistoryTeacher: resources for and topics on teaching history
#phdchat: graduate school issues

Community

#twitterstorians: historians on Twitter

Annual Meeting

#AHA2011, #AHA2012, #AHA2013: the AHA’s annual meeting hashtags
#session138: crowdsourcing session at the 126th annual meeting
#THATcamp: not just limited to AHA annual meeting, but a popular hashtag during it

This post first appeared on AHA Today.