Graduate Student News

SUMMER 2022

Dustin Meier, “Secure from the World's Contagions: Settlement House Summer Camping in the Twentieth Century,” Bart Elmore, advisor
James Turner, “Singular, Fiery, Smoky: A Food History of the U.S.-Mexican War,” Joan Cashin, advisor
Greyson Teague, “Pioneers in the Halls of Power: African Americans in Congress, 1928-1973,” David Stebenne, advisor
Nicole Freeman, “'Our Children Are Our Future': Child Care, Education, and Rebuilding Jewish Life in Poland After the Holocaust, 1944 – 1950,” Robin Judd, advisor
 

AUTUMN 2022

Svetlana Ter-Grigoryan, “'There is No Sex in the USSR': Sex, Soviet Identity, and Glasnost, 1986-1991,” David Hoffmann and Nicholas Breyfogle, advisors
 

SPRING 2023

Andrew Koperski, “Bishops and Books: Literary Authenticity and Authority in Early Christianity,” Kristina Sessa, advisor
Joshua Morrow, “Forming a Lost Cause: Confederate Nationalism, Compound-Public Spaces and the Re-Establishment of Democratic Hegemony,” Joan Cashin and John Brooke, advisors
Rob Williams, “The Airborne Mafia: Organizational Culture and Institutional Change in the U.S. Army, 1940–1965,” Peter Mansoor, advisor
Sydney Miller, “Politics, Gender, and the Crisis of the Virginia Gentry: 1824 - 1837,” John Brooke, advisor
 

Christopher Kinley, Presidential Fellowship, 2022-2023. Most prestigious graduate student award given by the Graduate School. Conducted research for dissertation “'We Are Not Sheep!': War, Military Occupation, and the Politic of Ethnicity in Europe’s Forgotten Borderland, 1912-1925."

Nicholas Seay, American Councils Title VIII Research Scholar (funded by the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Intelligence and Research). Conduct field research in Tajikistan for his dissertation "Cotton Modernity: Agricultural Labor, Neo-Materialism, and Soviet Power in Tajikistan, 1953-1982." Dissertation will combine oral and archival history research to tell the story of collectivized cotton production in Tajikistan from the perspective of agricultural workers in Tajikistan. By focusing on the experiences of rural cotton-growers, Seay’s work will show how cotton monoculture limited the party’s and state’s goals of economic and social transformation of the countryside and instead contributed to significant poverty and the maintenance of strong regional identities in the Tajik countryside.

Leyla Tiglay, Ernest May Fellowship in History and Policy, Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. Conduct research for dissertation “Nuclear Policy in the Age of Decolonization: French Nuclear Tests in the Sahara, African Peace Mobilization, and the Advent of the Global Nuclear Order 1957-1967,” which explores the nexus of nuclear diplomacy and decolonization against the background of French nuclear tests in the Sahara and the evolving international nuclear regime between 1957 and 1967.

Emily Hardick, Fulbright Commission and Belgian American Educational Foundation, autumn 2022. Conducted research in Belgium for a dissertation focusing on the colonial and postcolonial transnational circulation of Congolese dance and theater, with specific attention to a 1950s performance group created by the Belgian colonial administration, Changwe Yetu, which toured between the Belgian Congo (today, the Democratic Republic of the Congo) and Belgium.

Kiki Mackaman-Lofland, Presidential Fellowship, 2023-2024. Will conduct research for dissertation, "Academic Knowledge in Colonial Context: The Faculté des lettres d'Alger, French Policy, and Colonial Society in Algeria, 1930-1962," which focuses on the social and intellectual history of the French humanities college in Algiers from the 1930s until the years following Algerian independence in 1962.

Justin Salgado, Fulbright U.S. Student Program Open Study/Research award. Will travel to Mexico to conduct research for dissertation, “AIDS on the Margins: The HIV/AIDS Epidemic in El Paso and Cd. Juárez, 1987-2000,” which examines the history of HIV/AIDS in the two cities and the experiences of queer communities, sex workers, women factory workers, intravenous drug users, public health institutions, and community activist groups during the critical years of the AIDS epidemic.

Michael Corsi, Duncan Fellowship, 2022-2023. First Duncan Fellowship awardee. Corsi's dissertation, “A Metropolis of Metal: Urbanization and the Rise of Russia’s Industrial Heartland, 1887-1945,” examines the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century industrialization and urbanization of Ekaterinburg, a city that became one of the most vital economic and industrial centers of the Soviet Union. Corsi’s project will highlight the importance of historical research on current-day geopolitical issues, and will elucidate the dynamics of mining, industrial development, and fossil-fuel utilization to U.S. scholars and policymakers alike, thus providing an empirically-grounded analysis at a time when U.S.-Russian relations remain tense.

Michael Kraemer, Duncan Fellowship, 2023-2024. Will conduct research for dissertation, “Reclaiming Sheet'ká: the history of Novo-Arkhangel'sk from 1799-1880," which focuses on the history of southeast Alaska and the relations between Russian and American colonizers and the Tlingit people between 1799 and 1880. Kraemer’s research will illuminate the history of Russian and American colonialism and its effects on Lingít Aaní (the lands of the Tlingit) and emphasize the impacts of the Tlingit people on Russian and American colonial systems.

Edward Kunz, Melton Graduate Fellowship in Jewish Studies, 2022-2023 Conduct research for dissertation, "Beirut in the Crosshairs: U.S.-Israel Diplomacy and The Lebanon Conflict, 1977-1985," which examines the diplomatic relationship between Israel and the United States during the Carter and Reagan presidencies, with particular emphasis on the Lebanese Civil War, the 1982 Lebanon War, and the roles of both in formulating Carter and Reagan’s approaches to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The Department celebrated the following award recipients at the annual Graduate Student Awards Reception held on April 25, 2023 at the Faculty Club.