department of history at university of nebraska-lincoln 2014-2015 annual report

28
HISTORY.UNL.EDU DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA-LINCOLN 2014-2015 ANNUAL REPORT GLOBAL. INNOVATIVE. MENTORSHIP. GLOBAL. INNOVATIVE. MENTORSHIP.

Upload: unl-history-department

Post on 23-Jul-2016

220 views

Category:

Documents


7 download

DESCRIPTION

Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

TRANSCRIPT

Page 1: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

HISTORY.UNL.EDU

DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA-LINCOLN

2014-2015 ANNUAL REPORT

GLOBAL. INNOVATIVE. MENTORSHIP. GLOBAL. INNOVATIVE. MENTORSHIP.

Page 2: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

It is a pleasure once again to recognize the achievements of our faculty, staff, alumni, and students and to present the Annual Report of the Department of History. The 2014-2015 academic year was marked by the retirement of two distinguished and long-serving faculty members.

Professor Lloyd Ambrosius served the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with distinction for 48 years as a leading scholar of American foreign relations in the twentieth century, as a teacher for thousands of undergraduate students, as chair of the Department of History, and as chair and host of the Thompson Forum on World Issues lecture series. He was awarded one of the University of Nebraska’s highest honors this year, the Louise Pound-George Howard Distinguished Career Award.

Professor Ann Kleimola served the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with distinction for 43 years as a scholar of Russian society and culture, with a special focus on medieval iconography, architecture, art, and the history of animals, a teacher with wide-ranging interests and expertise, and an early leader in the development of women’s history and women’s and gender studies at the University of Nebraska.

We will miss both Professor Ambrosius and Professor Kleimola, and we thank them for their many contributions to the Department of History and the university.

As we look forward to the 2015-2016 academic year, we are focusing on the qualities that define our undergraduate and graduate program: innovative research, excellent teaching and mentoring, and global engagement.

All three of these defining qualities can be seen in the new courses we are designing for freshman students. Our first batch of “gateway” seminars include: The History of the Present United States, The History of Hip Hop, The History of Modern Crime, and Making and Breaking Law in U.S. History. Each blends faculty research with excellent teaching and mentoring in ways that address global themes.

You can read here about the many successes of our alumni and current students, including senior history major, Ann Himes, who was selected in 2015 for a Truman Scholarship, one of the most prestigious national awards recognizing public service.

We hope you will come back to campus this fall and visit the University of Nebraska Department of History. We will host the Carroll R. Pauley Lecture on October 8, 2015. Professor Darlene Clark Hine will speak on the theme of reckoning with history. She is a leading historian of the African American experience who helped found the field of black women’s history and has been one of its most prolific scholars. A past-president of the Organization of American Historians and the Southern Historical Association and the winner of numerous honors and awards, she is the Board of Trustees Professor of African American Studies and History at Northwestern University.

I especially want to thank all of the donors and supporters of the department this past year for their generosity. These gifts have supported students, enabled innovative research, and provided funding to start new projects. I hope that you will consider supporting the Department of History with a gift this year. You can find details about giving to all of The University of Nebraska Foundation’s Department of History funds on the inside back cover of this Annual Report. Again, thank you to our donors and supporters.

Best,

William G. Thomas IIIChair

WELCOME

Page 3: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

TABLE OF CONTENTS

GLOBALPAULEY PUBLISHES PIONEERING HISTORY 2

JACOBS TO TEACH AT CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY 3

STRAUSS SHINES IN GERMANY 3

CZECH SCHOLAR VISITS NEBRASKA 4

UNL HOSTS ARMENIAN GENOCIDE CONFERENCE 5

MALLORY GOES TO THE WHITE HOUSE 6

ARI WINS ACLS FELLOWSHIP 7

INNOVATIVEBEYOND RUNZA: THE STORIES OF GERMANS FROM RUSSIA 8

NEW DIGITAL PROJECT BRINGS HIDDEN HISTORY TO LIGHT 9

WINGO WINS ANDREW W. MELLON POST DOC 10

PROFESSOR EMILY ROSENBERG GIVES 2014 PAULEY LECTURE 11

MILLER IS AWARDED OAH PRIZE 11

MENTORSHIPTHREE PROFESSORS TAKE TOP HONORS 13

JONES WINS THE LAKE AWARD FOR ACADEMIC FREEDOM 13

ALUMNI INTERVIEW: PABLO RANGEL 14

ANN HIMES NAMED TRUMAN SCHOLAR 15

CATCHING UP WITH ALUMNI: REX BURKHEAD 16

NOTESUNDERGRADUATE CHAIR REPORT 17

GRADUATE CHAIR REPORT 17

FACULTY NOTES 18-19

NOTES FROM HGSA PRESIDENT 19-20

GRADUATE NOTES 20-22

ALUMNI COUNCIL 22

BOOK NOTES 23

UPCOMING EVENTS 24

IN MEMORIUM 24

DONORS 2014-2015 24

HISTORY FUND 25

CREDITSEDITOR: William G. Thomas IIIDESIGN & CONCEPT: Mikal EckstromCONTRIBUTERS: Samantha Bryant, Bedross Der Martosssian, Mikal Eckstrom, Deann Gayman, Vanessa Gorman, Margaret Jacobs, Leslie Reed, and Gerald SteinacherPHOTOGRAPHY: Craig Chandler, Bedross Der Martossian, Mikal Eckstrom, Troy Fed-derson, and Greg NathanCOVER: Images from the October 18, 2014 History Harvest, Lincoln, NE. Used with permission from individual donors.

Page 4: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

GLOBAL

Q&A:Q: Throughout Pioneering History you show your love of dates. What do they mean to you personally?

A: Well, I don’t know if I really love dates as much as I realize how they have shaped my life and history in general. I was lucky to have been born at the right time. My career benefited from my low birth year (1937) which facilitated my being accepted into an elite liberal arts college and later into graduate school. Still later it helped me get my first full-time job at a time when colleges were frantic to hire professors to handle the flood of post-World War II baby boom-ers. My Volga German ancestors ben-efited from emigrating to Nebraska in 1878 at a time when the cost of farmland had decreased by 50 percent since the Panic of 1873. My great-grandfather sold his farm near Harvard, Nebraska, in 1908 when the cost of land had skyrocketed. My birth date turned out to be the gift that kept on giving right down to the

present.

Q: Why did you become interested in Austria? You went there as part of what then was called the Institute of European Studies (IES) and is now known as the Institute for International Education of Students. Did that time abroad have a direct impact on your course of study? If so, why?

A: My parents were avid travelers even before they were married and met on a ship headed for Europe in 1930. They continued to travel during my father’s years in the Navy in World War II and reached a high point in 1954 when our whole family took a three-month trip to Europe when I was sixteen. My early in-terest in Europe encouraged me to study German during my first two years of college. It then made sense to study in a German-speaking country like Austria. I was already aware of Austria’s historic past as a multi-national empire preced-ing the First World War, and the impor-tance of the country being annexed to Germany in 1938 which helped lead to the outbreak of World War II. I was also attracted by it being nearly surrounded by Communist countries: Czechoslova-kia, Hungary, and Yugoslavia. Studying in Austria and traveling throughout Europe enabled me to see America through the eyes of others. The whole experience demonstrated the importance of interna-tional travel and a liberal arts education.

Q: When reflecting on your college edu-cation and then professorial career you provide many teachable moments for graduate students. What wisdom would you like to impart to future historians?

continued on page 7

PAULEY PUBLISHES PIONEERING HISTORY

BRUCE PAULEYQ & A CONDUCTED VIA

TELEPHONE & EDITED BY

MIKAL ECKSTROM

In 2014 Bruce F. Pauley, a distinguished alumnus of the Department of History (M.A. 1961), published Pioneering History on Two Continents: An Autobiography with Potomac Press. A scholar of Austria and Central Europe in the twentieth century, Pauley has published major works in the field, including Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini: Totalitarianism in the Twentieth Century (1997), From Prejudice to Persecution: A History of Austrian Anti-Semitism (1992), and Hitler and the Forgotten Nazis: A History of Austrian National Socialism (1981). Pauley’s connections to the University of Nebraska and the Department of History are deep. Pauley’s father, Carroll R. Pauley, graduated from the University of Nebraska in 1930, served in World War II, and headed the Pauley Lumber Company in Lincoln, NE. History was his lifelong passion. The Pauley family supports the Carroll R. Pauley Memorial Endowment in the Department of History to promote the public dissemination of history and historical research through an annual lecture series and a triennial symposium.

Page 5: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

3[ ]

STRAUSS SHINES IN GERMANYLast year, Paul Strauss, a doctoral candidate in history at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln,was awarded a Fulbright Research Grant to conduct dis-sertation research in Germany during the 2014-15 academic year. This year, he continues his dissertation research with the Leibniz-Institute for European History in Mainz, Germany.

Strauss, a native of Bellflower, Mo., who earned a master’s degree in education from Truman State University in Kirksville, Mo., said he plans to study 16th-century Christian sermons and texts, identify-ing the ways in which Muslims and Jews are portrayed. Strauss said he believes that examining earlier Christian texts is important in understanding the identity formations of Christian denominations. Strauss said religious studies in Germany are especially important and crucial to understanding the complexities of early European history. PAUL STRAUSS

UNL’s Margaret Jacobs has been se-lected as the University of Cambridge’s Pitt Professor of American History and Institutions for 2015-16.

As a Pitt Professor, Jacobs, Chancellor’s Professor of History, will spend a full year at Cambridge University, teach-ing classes, giving lectures, mentoring graduate students and furthering her own research.

“There are so many archives that I wouldn’t have had access to before,” she said.

Jacobs’ research focuses on the history of women, children, and families in the American West in comparison with other settler societies, including Australia and Canada. She particularly examines cross-cultural dynamics between white and Indigenous women. Her most recent book, A Generation Removed: The Fostering and Adoption of Indig-enous Children in the Postwar World, was published last fall by University of Nebraska Press. Her work on indigenous people is unique among past historians selected for the professorship, as are her Nebraska ties.

“Professor Jacobs is the first to be ap-pointed from the University of Ne-braska,” said Gary Gerstle, Paul Mellon professor of history at Cambridge Uni-versity. “We believe that she is also the first whose work focuses on indigenous peoples.”

The honor, which is given by a commit-tee of Cambridge faculty, came as a sur-prise to Jacobs, since the professorship is not something faculty can apply for.

“I didn’t even know it existed,” Jacobs

JACOBS TO TEACH AT CAMBRIDGE

said, adding that when she received an email regarding her selection, “it was a little bit surreal.”

This visiting professorship dates back to 1944, and has been held by some of the most distinguished historians and social scientists in the United States since its in-ception, Gerstle said. “A nominee must have achieved the highest standards of scholarship and have acquired an inter-national reputation,” Gerstle said. “Professor Jacobs meets those stan-dards. We are excited that she will be joining us next year.”

continued on page 5

MARGARET JACOBS

He anticipates completing his disserta-tion in 2016. Writer: University Communications

Page 6: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

Q&A:Q & A CONDUCTED VIA

E-MAIL & EDITED BY

MIKAL ECKSTROM

CZECH SCHOLAR VISITS NEBRASKA

Q: Can you talk about the importance of Czech heritage as it is experienced in the US and its connection to memory?

A: Interesting and intriguing question. There are probably between two to three million people with some trace of Czech or Slovak ancestry (not much perhaps on the larger scale, but we are talking about their mother countries with the size of 10 and 5 million inhabit-ants respectively). The bond between Czechs at home and abroad was prob-ably the strongest around the time

when Czechoslovakia had been created (1918) and when it became a Commu-nist satellite (1948), but the connection still exists. Locations such as Wilber, NE, called the Czech capital of USA, or the Czech Museum in Cedar Rapids, IO, are just two examples. And if you walk around the monuments in Lincoln’s Vet-erans Memorial Garden, you realize just how many of the soldiers’ names have a distinct Czech origin.

Many American-Czech cultural events that can be seen in the USA today are actually re-creations of the “beautiful past.” They reflect the memories and ideas which the immigrants brought with them from their homeland across the Atlantic long ago, whether 1878, 1948, or 1968. This does not imply their lack of realism in the modern sense; on the contrary, it makes them extremely interesting from not only historical, but also ethnographical or anthropological point of view.

And the connection is alive. Not only that one can still study Czech, a rather obscure language, at several universi-ties, including Lincoln, but just the bare fact that during my time in the US everyone, who could claim any Czech heritage, was eloquent and proud about it, and stressed its importance.

Q: You spoke about the consolidation of Czech media during your lecture at the University of Nebraska-Omaha, what do you think that does to intellectualism?

A: Perhaps it’s a game of words, but these changes, when media ownership is consolidated in hands of a very few entrepreneurs (and one politician) is not only devastating for the intellectu-als but also for the whole society. The intellectual, especially on the Left side of political and ideological scale, a critic of neoliberalism, does not yet have proper ammunition for his eloquent pen. And he probably never read the mainstream newspaper anyway. It is a tragedy for the general public, for the average media consumer, who is not aware of the fact that newspaper and TV news are converted into PR and power instruments. One thing that could be done in the future to help the people understand the change is to remove the holy grail of objectivity and non-biased journalism. Maybe it’s time to revert to a modern version of 19th century partisan-ship. Here is the role of the intellectual: to discuss, debate, and define the role of media in 21th century.

Q: What, if I may ask, is your next proj-ect?

A: Right now I have finished editing a book of interviews with some 15 Czech journalists. After that I will take a week off and then go back to the pile of material I’ve brought with me from USA, above all from all the archives at Lincoln. I have several hundreds of pages to go through and mine for data, but I am very much looking forward to it.

In the Spring 2015 semester the De-partment of History hosted Dr. Vladimir Polach as the Frank A. Belousek Dis-tinguished Scholar. Known for his work on Czech language and literature, Dr. Polach’s academic interests and publica-tions reflect Nebraska’s long-standing relationship to issues surrounding Czech immigration and culture. Dr. Polach came to UNL from the Department of Czech language and literature at Palacky University, Olomouc where he has been on the faculty since 2004. He holds a joint Ph.D. in History and Czech lan-guage from Palacky University awarded in 2003. During the spring 2014 semes-ter, he lectured at University of Ne-braska- Omaha, University of Nebraska- Kearney, University of Nebraska- Lincoln, and at Wilber- Clatonia High School on a wide range of topics relating to modern Czech culture, both in the Czech Re-public and in Nebraska. He also taught “Czech History and Culture” at UNL, a 300-level course for undergraduates.

VLADIMIR POLACH

Page 7: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

5[ ]

UNL HOSTS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE COMMEMORATING THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

On the occasion of the Centennial of the Armenian Genocide, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) on March 19-20, 2015, hosted a two-day interna-tional conference entitled, “Crossing the Centennial: The Historiography of the Armenian Genocide Re-Evaluated,” at the Wick Alumni Center, Great Hall, in Lincoln. Organized by Prof. Bedross Der Matossian from UNL’s Department of History, the conference was spon-sored by the Norman and Bernice Harris Center for Judaic Studies, the National Association for Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR), the Society for Arme-nian Studies (SAS), the Department of History, the Faculty Senate Convocation Committee, the Human Rights and Hu-manitarian Affairs Program, the Women’s and Gender Studies Program, and the Institute of Ethnic Studies at UNL. The conference focused on four under-researched themes that have recently gained scholarly attention and analytical depth: humanitarianism and humanitar-ian intervention in the Armenian Geno-cide; women and children in the Arme-nian Genocide; comparative dimensions of the Armenian Genocide; and the impact of the Armenian Genocide on society, politics, literature, and culture. Seventeen scholars from Armenia, Cam-bodia, Canada, Holland, Hungary, Israel, and the United States participated in the conference. On March 19, the chair of the History Department, Prof. William G. Thomas III, offered welcoming remarks in which he emphasized the commit-ment of the department to teaching and research of the field of Holocaust and genocide studies. Der Matossian then

made opening remarks in which he gave a brief background about the Armenian Genocide and highlighted the impor-tance of commemorating the Centennial in the academic sphere. Der Matossian also criticized the latest trend of denial-ism surging in the academic sphere. Towards the end of the conference Prof. Lloyd Ambrosius from the UNL Depart-ment of History gave the concluding remarks, in which he thanked all of the participants for the illuminating and productive conference, and hailed it as a great success that attracted a diverse set of audience and participants.

Writer: Bedross Der Matossian

CONFERENCE ATTENDEES

(continued from page 3 Jacobs)

Jacobs won the Bancroft Prize, a top award in American history, in 2010 for her book White Mother to a Dark Race: Settler Colonialism, Maternalism, and the Removal of Indigenous Children in the American West and Australia, 1880-1940.“The historians who have been invited are so accomplished,” Jacobs said. “I just can’t believe I’m joining that list.”Gerstle said Jacobs will play an integral role in both the undergraduate and graduate programs, and will be involved in the Cambridge American History Sem-inar, a weekly seminar at which scholars from across the U.S., U.K., and Europe present current works.“Through these seminars, she will have an opportunity to meet scholars from all over the world whose interests intersect with hers,” he said.

Writer: Deann Gayman

Page 8: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

MALLORY GOES TO THE WHITE HOUSE

Alexander Mallory, a senior history and political science major, and Rebekka Schlichting, a graduate student in the College of Journalism and Mass Com-munications, met with members of the Obama administration and heard a keynote address from First Lady Michelle Obama during the visit in early July. More than 1,000 youths from about 240 tribes attended. Participants engaged with government officials and elected leaders, including Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, White House Domestic Policy Council Director Cecilia Munoz and U.S. Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-North Dakota), a member of the Committee on Indian Affairs.

To be chosen for the conference, both Mallory and Schlichting entered the Generation Indigenous Challenge with a plan to improve their community. Gen-eration Indigenous, or Gen-I, is a new initiative by President Obama with the goal of investing in Native youths and, in turn, helping them invest in their com-munities. Mallory and Schlichting, each of whom intern at the Nebraska Com-mission for Indian Affairs, will be helping with programming at this year’s Native Youth Leadership Camp in Crete. The camp’s focus is on leadership develop-ment.

At the Washington event, Assistant Sec-retary for Indian Affairs Kevin Washburn and other administration officials hosted roundtable discussions regarding tribal sovereignty, or tribes’ rights to govern themselves, manage tribal property and regulate tribal business and domestic relations as well as establish governmen-

tal relationships with the federal govern-ment.

“The vast majority of non-Natives and even some Natives are unaware of this very important concept,” Mallory, a member of the Winnebago tribe, said. “It was encouraging to have a discussion on what sovereignty meant to us and hear competing viewpoints.”

Mallory and Schlichting said they were impressed and motivated by the gather-ing.

“Michelle Obama spoke about the resilience in Indian Country that I have witnessed throughout my lifetime,” Schlichting of the Ioway tribe said. “It’s good to know that we are recognized for positive actions and not just the nega-tives. She also gave me hope when she

said that the White House has our backs. She made me feel empowered and hopeful for our futures.”

The students also met with members of the Ponca Tribe and visited the National Museum of the American Indian.

Mallory said being a part of the meeting was empowering, too.

“Witnessing over 1,000 Native youth coalescing to address the issues of our community was truly something to behold,” Mallory said. “It was a tremen-dous privilege to attend the gathering and represent our tribes, university, and state.”

Writer: Deann Gayman

REBEKKA SCHLITCHTING, ASST. SEC FOR INDIAN AFFAIRS KEVIN WASHBURN, & ALEXANDER MALLORY

Page 9: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

7[ ]

ARI AWARDED ACLS FELLOWSHIP

WASKAR ARI

In 2015, Associate Professor of His-tory and Ethnic Studies, Waskar Ari was awarded an American Council of Learned Societies Fellowship. Ari re-ceived one of seventy awards to faculty of all ranks and independent scholars to support research in the humanities and humanistic social sciences. ACLS received over 1,000 applications in this cycle, making the program once again the most competitive in ACLS’s portfolio.

“Fellows were chosen for their potential to create new knowledge resulting from investigations and reflections on diverse cultures, texts, and artifacts from across the globe and human history,” said Mat-thew Goldfeder, director of fellowship programs at ACLS. “ACLS employs a rigorous multi-stage peer-review pro-cess to ensure that humanities scholars themselves select those fellows who exemplify the very best in their fields. The 70 fellows this year represent more than 50 colleges and universities and an array of humanities disciplines, including linguistics, religious studies, architectural history, and geography,” Goldfeder said in a statement released by the ACLS.The ACLS Fellowship will allow Ari to

spend time researching and writing his new project, Indigenous Women’s Strategies of Autonomy: Segrega-tion, Sexuality, and Agrarian Reforms in Bolivia, 1870-1964. According to Ari, the project “concerns the develop-ment and circulation of discourses of social and economic autonomy among Aymara women.” The research project also “shows that while internal colo-nialism was restructured in the making of the Bolivian nation-state, Aymara women created their own mechanisms of decolonization.” By comparing “the tra-jectories of four generations of women in the indigenous area of Carabuco, it demonstrates “that the two Bolivian Agrarian Reforms of 1874 and 1953 were both ultimately concerned only with an ideology that reinforced the dominant heterosexualism and patriariarcalism in a segregated country. By addressing marginalized groups, including single mothers, sexual minorities, and or-phaned female children, the work offers an account of this period that reshapes Latin American rural history.”

Writer: Mikal Eckstrom

A: First, let me say that I enormously enjoyed my career as a historian. But studying history opens up many career opportunities, not just teaching. Only yesterday I played golf with a former criminal defense attorney who had been a history major in college. As far as les-sons I learned, one is how long it takes to research, write, and publish an article or book. This knowledge is all the more important when it comes to getting tenure. I also suggest that an untenured professor should resist the temptation to teach too many different courses as preparation for each one is enormously time consuming. By the same token, try to hold your committee assignments to a minimum because they too will delay your efforts to publish. Before accepting a position, try to determine whether you and your chairman are compatible. Dif-fering personalities and values can have disastrous consequences for an unten-ured professor. Let me also suggest thatwhen asking for references from your for-mer professors or from your peers that you thank them even if your applications turn out to be unsuccessful.

Q: One of the things I enjoyed when reading your book is that I found out that your earlier work challenged the notion that Austria was a mere victim of Nazi Germany. As I understand it, your interpretation ran counter to the orthodox views of the time. In talking with other Ph.D. students who work on Austria, they have told me that the myth of victimization is still very popular in Austria. Now, 30 years later, where do you see Austria and its relationship to its Nazi past. continued on page 12

continued from page 2 (Pauley)

Page 10: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

BEYOND RUNZA: HARVESTING THE HISTORY OF GERMANS FROM RUSSIA, WITH GERALD STEINACHER

In Nebraska, traditionally a farming state, harvesting occupies a central place in life. As historians we do not harvest corn or soy, but rather history. This is the begin-ning of my standard explanation to the many people asking me what the history harvest class is all about.

In the History Harvest class each year students work with local communities willing to share their histories or fam-ily documents. Students collect diaries, photographs, letters, maps, official docu-ments, war memorabilia, and other fam-ily and cultural heirlooms. “Harvested” family artifacts are digitized and returned to their owners. Students then publish a selection of these family treasures on the History Harvest website http://history-harvest.unl.edu to make them available online for interested people here in the state but also worldwide.

The History Harvest project was started in 2010 by the Department of History and is co-directed by Professors William Thom-as and Patrick Jones. It provides students with a hands-on experience through which they learn how to collect, orga-nize and critically interpret sources. The History Harvest model inspired already other universities and is part of our De-partment’s strong focus on digital history.

During the 2014 Fall semester I took my first history harvest “journey” with seven undergraduate students. Jake Friefeld, who was a teaching assistant for the pre-vious harvest, helped with much needed technical advice. Choosing a community to partner with was easy, as I already had established strong ties with the Germans

from Russia community. Ethnic Germans settled in the Russian Empire over two hundred years ago, but economic and political turmoil around 1900 forced many of them out of their traditional home regions. Attracted by promises of cheap land and opportunity they crossed the ocean and settled in the Midwest, which resembled the lands they had to leave behind. Here they started anew,

INNOVATIVE

keeping their traditional lifestyle and lan-guage alive until the 1940s. The Museum of the American Historical Society of Ger-mans from Russia in Lincoln with its richlibrary and archives (www.ahsgr.org) has taken on the responsibility of keeping the history of this community alive. continued on page 14

POSTER FOR FALL 2014 HISTORY HARVEST

Page 11: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

9[ ]

NEW DIGITAL PROJECT BRINGS HIDDEN HISTORY TO LIGHT

Slavery has often been painted in broad strokes in history books and narratives, giving little attention to slaves’ daily lives and social networks. For more than a century, these broad strokes have made it nearly impossible for their descendants to trace their heritage.

An ongoing collaboration between Uni-versity of Nebraska-Lincoln and Univer-sity of Maryland researchers, however, is filling in some of the missing pieces.

The O Say Can You See: Early Wash-ington, D.C., Law and Family Project is digitally archiving petitions for freedom lawsuits that were filed in the U.S. Circuit Court in the nation’s capital from 1800 to 1862, up until the Emancipation Proc-lamation that was issued Jan. 1, 1863. The court records add texture to stories about slaves, the slaveholders, and the families and power brokers of early Washington.

The project has quickly grown to host more than 1,200 documents from about 250 petitions for freedom. In the next year, those numbers will grow to about 4,000 documents from nearly 400 peti-tions. By March, the project aims to put online every petition for freedom case in Washington, D.C., between 1800 and 1862 for scholars, teachers and the public.

Digitizing the petitions puts the individu-al experiences of slaves at the forefront, said William G. Thomas, UNL professor of history and the project’s principal investigator.

“We need to put enslaved individuals at

the center and represent their life histo-ries in ways that we’ve not yet been able to do and the digital environment allows us to attempt to do that, to represent individual experience in the larger con-text of a dehumanizing social system,” Thomas said.

Halfway through a two-year grant from the National Endowment for the Hu-manities, Thomas and researchers from UNL’s Center for Digital Research in the Humanities and colleagues from the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities have revealed previously invisible family networks and have given dimension to the everyday lives of slave families through their social ties.

“The family networks that we’re begin-ning to uncover are deep, extensive, are multi-generational and they move across race,” Thomas said. “Individual slave petitioners are connected into white and black families in D.C. in ways that we may not have realized. Now we can start to see those patterns.”

Until the project took flight, the only real record of these petitions was a bare-bones index of records in the National Archives and Records Administration, where the original documents are kept.

Thomas said that many more petitions of freedom have been found than were previously thought to exist. This is a boon to the project, he said -- each peti-tion “is capable of adding a new dimen-sion to what we know about how these suits were brought, in the first place, who knew whom, and the social fabric of early Washington.

“When you look at the whole collection of these petitions for freedom, you can start to see the social world of enslaved families in the Washington D.C. area in a way that we otherwise couldn’t,” Thomas said. “You wouldn’t be able to put the whole family network together, if you were just looking at one case.”

Thomas said the family networks being uncovered would be useful to African American genealogists.

“This resource is going to be available to tap into and start to piece together some family history that they may not have been able to penetrate because of the inscrutability of these documents and because disentangling these names and relationships is extraordinarily dif-ficult work,” he said.

Writer: Deann Gayman

WILLIAM G. THOMAS III

Page 12: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

Q&A:Q & A CONDUCTED VIA

E-MAIL & EDITED BY

MIKAL ECKSTROM

Position title: Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in Digital Liberal Arts, Jan Serie Center for Scholarship and Teaching, Macalester College

Q: Congratulations on your Post-Doc at Macalester! Describe the process of ap-plying for a post-doc teaching position.

A: Applying for a postdoc requires you to meet an entirely different set of criteria than applying for a tenure-track position. Many require you to have a well-articulated research agenda on top of your teaching skills. In my experi-ence, this should stem from your disser-tation but should be more than merely editing your dissertation into a manu-script. For instance, I often applied for postdocs with the stated intention of developing a digital component to my dissertation, publishing spin-off articles from the dissertation, as well as editing the manuscript. Postdocs are designed for you to get ahead on your research, so reviewers want to be able to see your

agenda clearly.Q: What are your roles during your tenure at Macalester? What are the expectations/teaching requirements for your job?

A: My position at Macalester is two-pronged. In the Fall semester, any facul-ty interested in developing digital proj-ects or incorporating digital pedagogy will apply to work with me and sign a contract stating how much time per week they will devote to their projects. In return, they will get my expertise. I will also participate in an interdisciplin-ary faculty discussion group in which we develop a whitepaper about how to in-corporate digital scholarship into tenure and promotion. During this semester, I also plan to implement monthly Digital Liberal Arts workshops, showcases, or discussions. In the Spring semester, I will continue my consultations and teach a single course of my choosing. The ex-pectation is that this course will include a large digital component.

Q: Are you introducing any new courses to the college?

A: Macalester currently does not offer any digital humanities courses. I will teach one digital history course in the Spring.

Q: How has the graduate program at UNL prepared you for your job?

A: I firmly believe that having the Gradu-ate Certificate in Digital Humanities made me more competitive on the job market. From what I have been able to

MARGARET JACOBS & REBECCA WINGO

gather, few applicants had such quali-fications. The University of Nebraska-Lincoln has an outstanding national reputation for digital humanities, and Macalester was specifically looking for someone who had the kind of training that UNL provides.

Q: What don’t people tell you about the job search?

A: Well, people will tell you that be-ing on the job market is a full-time job. Believe them. You must keep your materials (C.V., research statements, teaching statements, syllabi, teaching portfolio, etc.) updated. Have these reviewed early and often by your advisor and other mentors. It will save you time when you’re actually applying for the jobs.

The real truth of the matter is that the job market is a huge time commit-ment for your letter writers as well. Be organized about how you present your job opportunities. Tell them if they have already written you a letter for a similar job; highlight the main items in the ap-plication requirements; tell them specifi-cally how you think you’re particularly qualified for that position; offer dead-lines and send reminders when they are near; and most of all, send them your application materials in advance. All of these things will help them write the best possible letter for you.

REBECCA WINGO (PH.D. ‘ 15) AWARDED MELLON POST DOC AT MACALESTER COLLEGE

Page 13: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

11[ ]

PROFESSOR EMILY ROSENBERG GIVES 2014 PAULEYLECTURE

People across the globe are remember-ing the World War I as 2014 marks the centennial of its start. As the war raged, the United States avoided the conflict for three years and was involved in its own imperial holdings, a history that has been largely overlooked.

How did the United States present itself on the world stage during World War I and what can be learned from the forgotten history of American colonies, protectorates and military occupations in those years?

Emily Rosenberg, professor and chair of the department of history at University of California, Irvine, explored these ques-tions during the annual Carroll R. Pauley Memorial Lecture, “The Great War and the American Empire.” The lecture was held on Oct. 23 in the Unity Room of the Jackie Gaughan Multicultural Center, 15th and S streets, adjacent to the Ne-braska Union.

“I seek to illuminate a nearly forgotten history about the relationship between the Great War and America’s impe-rial holdings, which during this period included colonies, protectorates, and countries controlled through U.S. military occupation,” Rosenberg said.

“My talk will also assess why this impor-tant chapter in the history of America’s international policy tended to be relatively invisible at the time and has remained even less visible in historical discussions ever since.

“My talk offers historical consideration of how U.S. involvement in the war affected what might at first seem an unrelated topic: policies toward America’s own imperial holdings in the Western Hemi-sphere and the Pacific.” The lecture was a homecoming for Rosenberg. She and her husband, Nor-man Rosenberg, received their bachelor of arts degrees from the University of Nebraska.

Writer: Deann Gayman

EMILY ROSENBERG

During its annual meeting in St. Louis, the Organization of American Historians (OAH) presented the National Under-ground Railroad Network to Freedom with the prestigious 2015 Stanton-Horton Award for Excellence in National Park Service History. The award, which

PH.D. CANDIDATE WINS OAH PRIZE

recognizes excellence in historical projects for, by, and with the National Park Service and is intended to honor projects that make the NPS exemplary in promoting civic dialogue about and ap-preciation of American history, is named for Robert G. Stanton, who served for almost four decades in the National Park Service, and James Oliver Horton, who is the Benjamin Banneker Professor of American Studies and History at George Washington University and Historian Emeritus of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History.

UNL Ph.d. candidate, Diane Miller, the primary project director, won the inaugural award for her work on, “Na-tional Underground Railroad Network to Freedom.”

The OAH award announcement stated: “The inaugural Stanton-Horton Award is given to the National Underground Rail-road Network to Freedom program ad-ministered by the National Park Service. The Network to Freedom program origi-nated from a 1998 congressional man-date and has grown to 550 members in 36 states plus the District of Columbia. Members include historic sites and markers, educational and interpretive programs, and facilities, such as archives and museums. There are 33 National Park Service sites included as members. The winning program has distinguished itself in three ways. First, the Network to Freedom (NTF) has identified through a lengthy and collaborative process criteria for NTF significance based upon verifiable primary sources. This criterion

continued on page 12

Page 14: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

legitimates the Underground Railroad beyond its so-called mythic status as a secret network and establishes its exis-tence with documented proof. The results of such rigorous demon-strable evidence are that American historical scholarship is substantially and significantly enlarged in a crucial area of study. Second, the Network to Freedom engages people in a vast network of col-laboration and scholarship. Individuals working alone or with an array of non-profit organizations join together to pool resources and cooperate in education, preservation, and commemorative activi-ties. Third, this vast modern-day network crosses boundaries of race, geography, and interest levels in history. Grassroots activists to professional historians across local and national venues join in the common cause of documenting Under-ground Railroad activities and sites. The Network to Freedom epitomizes the best in American historical scholarship and promotes active and sustained civic dialogue.”

The award was presented on April 18 by OAH’s 2014–15 President Patty Limerick and 2015–16 President Jon Butler. A total of 50 recipients received 2015 OAH awards.

P.H.D. CANDIDATE DIANE MILLER (RIGHT

WILLIAM THOMAS & BRUCE PAULEY AT THE 2014PAULEY LECTURE

continued from page 7 (Pauley)

A: Well, I have to confess that I have made only three brief trips to Austria since last doing research there in 1996, so I can’t claim to be an expert on con-temporary attitudes. However, it is safe to say that the scholarly community in Austria and much more of the general public is aware of the country’s anti-Semitic past than was true when I first began to research Austrian Nazism and anti-Semitism in the 1960s and 1970s. I hope that my books on these topics have contributed to these changing attitudes to some degree. At the same time, regarding the “myth” to which you refer, one should keep in mind that the Austrian government of the 1930s did try to resist the Nazis and had the fer-vent support of virtually all Jews. So one should remember that half-truths can in fact be half true.

Q: Your book has two very nice themes that end your autobiography—family and Russia. Can you share with us how those two things helped shape your view of history?A: The book, in fact, has several themes, two of which are indeed family and Russia. My family lived near the Lower Volga River for 111 years after making a fifteen-month epic journey from western Germany at the invitation of Catherine the Great. Writing Pioneering History did give me a sense of my place in history. I came to realize the importance of my ancestors in shaping the life that I enjoy today. My ancestors left Russia with little more than the shirts on their backs and a burning desire to work hard and improve their lives. Their decision paid off and enabled their descendants to avoid the horrible fate—Stalin’s collectivization of farms, mass starvation, and ultimately deportation to Siberia in 1941—that would have befallen them if the family had remained in Russia. My father, in

particular, loved history, and took our family to numerous historic sites starting with following the Oregon Trail when I was only nine. His enthusiasm for history was contagious, and what I have learned about my earlier ancestors has been inspiring. I strongly recommend that other people, especially young people, attempt to explore their family histories by interviewing their parents and grand-parents. It is a fascinating and rewarding enterprise.

Page 15: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

13[ ]

MENTORSHIP

TIM BORSTELMANN, KATRINA JAGODINKSY, & LYOLD AMBROSIUS

On Sunday, April 12, 2015, three Depart-ment of History faculty took home three awards from the Honors Convocation held at the Lied Center for Perform-ing Arts. Professor Tim Borstelmann received the Annis Chaikin Sorensen Award for Outstanding Teaching in the Humanities. This award recognizes cre-ative activities related to teaching in the humanities.

Professor Lloyd Ambrosius was awarded the Louise Pound-George Howard Distinguished Career Award, which recognizes those whose career at UNL has made an exceptional contribution to the university community. Established in 1990, the award recognizes individuals with a distinguished career of service to the university through teaching, re-search, public service, administration or a combination of factors. In his 48 years at UNL, Ambro-

THREE HISTORY PROFESSORS TAKEHOME TOP HONORS

sius helped shape and guide the E.N. Thompson Forum on World Issues; has influenced policy makers, particularly in the context of U.S. foreign policy; has served in many capacities, including vice-chair and chair of the history depart-ment; and mentored dozens of graduate and undergraduate students. Ambrosius is also a leading scholar on President Woodrow Wilson. Professor Katrina Jagodinsky won the Harold and Esther Edgerton Junior Fac-ulty Award. The award is presented each year to an outstanding junior faculty member who has demonstrated creative research, extraordinary teaching abilities and academic promise.

Writer: Univeristy Communications, Mikal Eckstrom

JONES RECEIVES THE LAKE AWARD FOR ACADEMIC FREEDOMPatrick Jones, associate professor of history and ethnic studies, received the James A. Lake Academic Freedom Award from the UNL Faculty Senate. The honor was established in 1980 to recog-nize an individual who made exceptional contributions defending, supporting and explaining the applications and practice of the principles of academic freedom.

Jones led the effort to raise national and international awareness about the case of Waskar Ari, a Bolivian scholar who was hired by UNL but denied re-entry to the United States for unspecified reasons. Jones is also a campus contact for Scholars at Risk, an international net-work of academic institutions designed to support and defend the principles of academic freedom and to defend the human rights of scholars around the world. He has also merged his research and civic engagement to promote racial justice.

Writer: University Communications

PATRICK JONES

Page 16: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

demanded excellence from me at every step of the program. The positive results are evident in the work I produced at UNL, but also in the scholarship I cur-rently contribute.

Q: How did the history department at UNL prepare you for your current posi-tion?

A: The Department provided me the opportunity to deeply engage Digital Humanities, and offered me the chance to work directly with undergraduate stu-dents as a teaching assistant. These two components afforded me considerable experience that I draw on in my current position. Additionally, the department faculty and staff trained me and encour-aged me to expand my professional network and to consistently seek oppor-tunities that could advance my academic and professional career.

Q: Where are you now?

A: I am beginning my third year in the Department of History PhD program at the University of Chicago. My disserta-tion research explores U.S. statecraft through an analysis of federal immigra-tion and agricultural policy legislation and enforcement. This summer I partici-pated as a Latino Museum Studies Pro-gram Fellow at the Smithsonian Latino Center in Washington, D.C. I contrib-uted to the Latino Virtual Museum.

Q: What area of history did you study at UNL? With who? Why?

A: I primarily engaged U.S. History and Latino & Latin American Studies. My M.A. thesis committee included James A. Garza (chair), Jeannette Eileen Jones, and Lloyd Ambrosius. Additionally, I worked closely with Patrick Jones, James Dean Le Sueur, and Gerald Stei-nacher. I valued this group’s wide range of expertise. Their various perspectives helped me to understand the intercon-nectivity central to seemingly disparate historical narratives. These professors

Q&A:Q & A CONDUCTED VIA

E-MAIL & EDITED BY

ALUMNI INTERVIEWPABLO RANGEL

PABLO RANGEL (BA’11/MA ‘13)

Q: How has studying history shape the ways in which you understand your own life?

A: I did not like my high school his-tory classes. I did not identify with the people, events, and places upon which those courses focused. Although I am an American I felt like an outsider when I read American History textbooks or listened to the lectures. Because I study history at a critical level I can scrutinize those outdated narratives and offer in-terpretations and analyses that are more inclusive and hopefully provide a more accurate historical representation. In this way, studying history has allowed me to put my family heritage and personal existence within an international and chronological context that helps me to feel connected to alternative historical experiences.

Q: Any favorite memories that you care to share?

A: I fondly recall HGSA meetings and working on the Rawley Coneference. Those times allowed me to get to know my fellow students outside of class. I rel-ished the chance to be around the more advanced grad students. I felt like I was a part of something special.

Page 17: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

15[ ]

continued from page 7 (History Harvest)

History major Ann Himes was one of two students who were awarded the Outstanding Student Leadership Award, recognizing their notable contributions toward the development of leader-ship qualities in their fellow students at UNL. The award recognizes outstanding leadership in academic, co-curricular, and extracurricular activities and involve-ments. Recipients of this award receive a scholarship with an approximate value of the cost of in-state tuition for one semester during the student’s senior year at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Himes has served as a senator on the ASUN, the student government body at UNL.

Himes was also selected as a Truman Scholar by the Harry S. Truman Schol-arship Foundation. As a 2015 Truman Scholar, she’ll have plenty of opportuni-ties to explore her path in public service and leadership. Himes was selected as one of only about 60 students nation-ally to receive the highly competitive,

JUAN FRANCO & ANN HIMES

HIMES WINSLEADERSHIP AWARD & TRUMAN SCHOLARSHIP

$30,000 scholarship, which rewards students who demonstrate leadership potential and who have an outstanding record of public service.

Himes, a 2012 graduate of Papillion-La Vista High School, has been a legislative intern and page, an Association of the Students of the University of Nebraska senator, a member of the University Honors Program, a member of the Chan-cellor’s Commission on the Status of Women, a Chi Omega sorority member and a volunteer with the progressive advocacy group Nebraska Appleseed.

UNL honored Himes at a reception April 9 in the Canfield Administration Build-ing, where family, Honors Program staff, mentors, professors and Chancellor Harvey Perlman celebrated her achieve-ment.

“Annie represents the university well and this shows the caliber of the student body that we have,” he said.

Growing up, she said she knew she wanted to work in public service. Her mother and her grandmother instilled in her a strong sense of community and need for social justice.

“They’re very progressive thinkers,” Himes said. “They’ve always engrained in me a knowledge and an awareness of social causes, and they’re very connect-ed to women’s causes.”

The scholarship, which is awarded to college juniors, can be used for gradu-ate or professional school. Himes said she plans to attend law school with an eye on a career working for policies and change in the treatment of women.

Himes is working to complete her continued on next page

After a number of small collection events we held our main history harvest on Oc-tober 18, 2014 at the Germans from Rus-sia Museum in Lincoln, where myself, seven undergraduate students and two of my graduate students staffed the vari-ous work-stations. We were fortunate to use the Museum as our home base, and felt very welcomed by director Sherry Pawelko, the staff and many volunteers. The turnout was very good and kept us busy all day. Among the treasures we gathered were pamphlets in both Ger-man and English, rare photos and wood-en eggs that were painted as part of an Easter tradition in the Ukraine. We had great interactions with interesting peo-ple, heard fascinating family stories, and most importantly had a good time at the Museum.

In the last two months of the semester we worked on cataloguing our findings in a database: photos, documents and interviews. For the online exhibition we featured a selection of items that showcased the traditional culture of the German-speaking immigrants, but also their increasing Americanization following World War I. In the course of completing the project students learned a number of important lessons: the importance of time management and organization skills, the value of follow-ing project guidelines and rules, and the usefulness of technology in the humanities. Students also learned that Nebraska had always been a culturally diverse state in which immigration had always played an important role. Finally, students came to recognize that foreign language skills are invaluable in in the study primary sources.

Writer: Gerald Steinacher

Page 18: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

CATCHING UP WITH OUR ALUMNI: REX BURKHEAD

degree in three majors -- Russian, history and global studies -- and hopes to study abroad again after completing a semes-ter in St. Petersburg, Russia. She said she would like to earn a Fulbright to study and teach overseas before studying law.

It was Himes’ involvement in student government at UNL, she said, where she learned to navigate the bureaucratic and activist sides of public policy.

“There is a really important balance be-tween people elected to serve and the citizens they serve,” Himes said. “I really found through student government that I wanted to be more in the activist role at UNL.”

As a legislative intern in the offices of State Sen. Danielle Conrad and State Sen. Heath Mello, Himes honed her future path.

“Working in the legislature, I was able to see how effective the senators are that have legal backgrounds, so I’d really like to pursue a law degree,” Himes said.

Himes said it was Conrad, now the direc-tor of the American Civil Liberties Union for Nebraska, who solidified her drive to pursue an activism.

“I have learned from her that law can be a very powerful tool in creating social change,” she said. “Ideally, I would find a job where I could use law to pursue social causes. That could be practicing law or working for a nonprofit as their attorney.”

Writer: Deann Gayman

Rex Burkead graduated with a B.A. in History in 2013. He currently playsprofessional football for the Cincinnati Bengals. At the University ofNebraska, Burkhead was selected in 2011 and 2012 as an AcademicAll-American and named to the All-Big Ten first team. He served as aco-captain of the Cornhuskers football team for the 2012-2013 season.

Q: What’s your favorite period or person in history and why?

A: “Ancient Greece History is my favor-ite time period because it’s veryinteresting to me to see how much tech-nology, government, economic, andsocial ideas during then laid a founda-tion for current advances in today’sworld.”

Q: What are you reading, watching, or listening to these days?

A: “These days I’m currently watching anything on TV that interest me. Idon’t really watch reality TV or series that much. Treehouse hunters isone show that I really like and honestly some HGTV cause I’m looking tobuy a house soon so I’m trying to get some ideas.”

Q: What did you like most about being a history major at Nebraska?

A: “What I liked most about being a his-tory major at Nebraska was the wayprofessors presented material and made lectures interactive with thestudents. They made class enjoyable and something to look forward tocoming to everyday.”

REX BURKHEAD

Q&A:Q & A CONDUCTED VIA

E-MAIL & EDITED BY

WILLIAM THOMAS

Page 19: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

17[ ]

UNDERGRADUATECHAIR REPORT

GRADUATE CHAIRREPORT

After a retreat focused in August 2014, the History faculty engaged in an intensive process of re-examining and revising our MA and PhD programs in 2014-15. We created new streamlined programs that are aimed at training our graduate students more effectively for a variety of historical careers in the twenty-first century. For the PhD program, we created six focus fields and developed a new intensive research seminar. For the MA program, we are developing new tracks, including a joint program with the College of Law. Our new programs put emphasis on the development of skills, especially in digital history, in addition to knowledge and expertise in content areas.

Writer: Margaret Jacobs

The Undergraduate Program has been invigorated by an active group of stu-dents in Phi Alpha Theta and the History Club. Led by co-presidents, Ashley McAndrew and Melani Hagge, the clubs sponsored many events, including a very successful movie night attended by some 75 students, featuring Invictus followed by a discussion led by Dawne Curry. They held a successful Meet the Professor with Laura Munoz, as well as a fall open house, a spring senior sendoff, and an invaluable career night. Phi Alpha Theta inducted twenty new members in all, and we graduated more than 30 history majors this May alone. Behind the scenes, we are develop-ing new, freshman gateway courses

MARGARET JACOBS

VANESSA GORMAN

Glenn Gray Award: Grace Brown History Department Service Award: Ashley McAndrew

Ed Hirsch Scholarship: Chelsey Pounds and Campbell Kennedy Allen P. Gerlach Scholarship: Melani Hagge and Brian Barmettler Larry R. Gerlach Scholarship: Jacob Garbison Alan Woolworth Scholarship: Griffen Farrar

Albin T. and Pauline Anderson Memorial Award: Catherine Medici-Thiemann

Helen & Perry Moran Scholarship: (American heritage): Brian Sarnacki

Dov Ospovat Award: Courtney Pixler

Marguerite C. and Clare McPhee Me-morial Fellowship: Mikal Eckstrom

UNDERGRADUATEAWARDS

GRADUATEAWARDS

to attract more majors earlier in their college career. In addition, Professors Ann Tschetter, Amy Burnett, and Vanessa Gorman have been participating in the American Historical Association’s Tuning Project, with the goal of establishing a new and better major assessment.

Writer: Vanessa Gorman

NOTES

Page 20: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

Others.” The address will be published in the January 2016 issue of the journal Diplomatic History.

Amy Burnett gave papers at the International Calvin Congress in Zu-rich, Switzerland and the Frühneuzeit Interdisziplinär (Early Modern Interdisci-plinary) Conference in Nashville, TN as well as talks on teaching Luther and the Reformation at the University of Chicago and at Luther Seminary in St. Paul. She also co-edited (with Kathleen Comerford and Karin Maag) a book, Politics, Gen-der, and Belief: The Long Term Impact of the Reformation: Essays in Memory of Robert M. Kingdon, that was published in January 2015.

David Cahan has completed and submitted to a press his biography of the German scientist Hermann von Helmholtz. He is now turning more of his academic focus and energies to the general topic of Science, Technology, and Economic Growth from 1770 to the Present.

Bedross Der Matossian has been active in the past year organizing conferences and giving talks in different universi-ties across the country. On November 21-22, 2014 he organized a conference marking the 40th Anniversary of the

founding of the Society for Armenian Studies (1974-2014). The conference entitled “Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in the 19th-20th Centuries” took place at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel, Washington, DC. On March 19-20, 2015 he organized a two-day major international conference at University of Nebraska-Lincoln for the centennial of the Armenian Genocide. In addition, he gave multiple talks on his book and the Armenian Genocide in Boston, Univer-sity of California-Los Angeles, Emory University, City of University of New York, and University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. He is currently working on his second major project on the Adana Massacres of 1909.

Vanessa Gorman was promoted to Full Professor this year, and her book, Corrupting Luxury in Ancient Greek Literature, co-authored with Robert Gorman, came out from the University of Michigan Press in November 2014. She is now deeply engaged in the Digital Athenaeus Project, trying to determine ways to teach the computer to identify authorship of Greek historical fragments through the analysis of dependency syntax.

Margaret Jacobs published A Genera-tion Removed: The Fostering and Adop-

FACULTYAWARDSAlbin T. and Pauline Anderson Faculty Award: Alexander Vazansky Albin T. and Pauline Anderson Faculty Award: Bedross Der Matossian Clay Thomas Faculty Research Grant: Dawne Curry Charles Henry Oldfather Faculty Research Grant: Dawne Curry Raymond Schmidt History Excellence Fund Faculty Research Grant:Patrick Jones

James A. Rawley Faculty Research Grant: Patrick Jones

FACULTY NOTESTim Borstelmann is serving as the President of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR) for 2015. He presided at the SHAFR annual meeting in Washington, D.C., in June, where he delivered his presi-dential address entitled “Inside Every Foreigner: How Americans Understand

MIKAL ECKSTROM, REBECCA WINGO, & JOHN BUCHKOSKI DURING WRITING WORKSHOP

Page 21: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

19[ ]

NOTES FROM HGSA PRESIDENT

for his new book project on the Catho-lic Church in the post-WWII years. This work in the National Archives and the United States Holocaust Memorial Mu-seum in Washington D.C. was supported by University grants. In addition, he has been awarded a prestigious Research Fellowship at the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, so he is looking forward to his stay in Israel in the fall of 2015.

Sean Trundle is currently working on putting together a series of workshops for all faculty teaching the US History survey workshops to enhance our use of digital technologies in the classroom. Additionally, he is putting together a book proposal to look at the intersection of science policy and popular culture in the post-War era, and fine tuning an article about the “Horatio Alger” styled narratives surrounding software entre-preneurs in the late 20th century.

William G. Thomas III received an Na-tional Endowment for the Humanities Collaborative Research grant in 2014 to conduct research on the history of early Washington, D.C., using the case files of the D.C. Circuit Court held in the National Archives. He is working on a legal and so-cial history of slavery in the early republic based on these cases. He served on the Program Committee of the 2015 Ameri-can Historical Association Conference to be held in New York City in January 2015. In addition, he has been appointed to the Executive Committee of the National Historical Publications and Records Com-mission (NHPRC) of the U.S. National Ar-chives and Records Administration.

tion of Indigenous Children in the Post-war World with University of Nebraska Press in 2014. She will be the visiting Pitt Professor of American History at Cam-bridge University in the UK in 2015-16.

Katrina Jagodinsky’s book will be released in Yale University Press’ Lamar Series in Western History in March 2016 and she won the Harold & Esther Edger-ton junior faculty award at UNL.

Carole Levin recently returned to the United States after six months in England as a Fulbright Scholar at the University of York where she conducted research on her book project, Boudica’s Daughters: Queens and Nationalism in the Tudor/Stuart Age and gave lectures all over the British Isles. Her edited col-lection, Scholars and Poets Talk About Queens (Palgrave - Macmillan) came out in August 2015. Gerald Steinacher is in the final stages of completing his book manuscript, Hu-manitarians in Crisis: The Red Cross in the aftermath of the Holocaust (working title), which is under contract with Oxford University Press. The book examines the institutional crisis of the Swiss-based International Committee of the Red Cross following the Committee’s failure to speak out against the Shoah. In June 2015 Gerald presented at an inter-national conference about the legacies of National Socialism held at the Uni-versity of Hannover (Germany) and at a conference commemorating the 70th anniversary of the end of WWII held at the former concentration camp of Mau-thausen (the biggest and most notorious Nazi camp on Austrian territory). Most of the summer he conducted research

SAMANTHA BRYANT

During the 2014-2015 academic year, the History Graduate Students’ Associa-tion remained successful, expanding workshop opportunities and facilitating a professional camaraderie among the members of the departmental graduate student community.

As HGSA President, I continued the tradition of hosting and coordinating workshops such as “Reckoning with His-tory: Race and Racism” in the fall 2014 semester and the spring 2015 “Teaching Gender and Sexuality Workshop” with the aid of Drs. Margaret Jacobs, Jean-nette Jones, Rose Holz, and Laura Mu-ñoz. Other workshops sponsored by the HGSA included the Digital Humanities Bootcamp for Beginners in conjunction with the Nebraska Forum on Digital Hu-manities and a workshop in the fall 2014 semester aimed at de-mystifying the job application process for federal govern-ment employment. I would like to again thank all graduate students, faculty, and staff in the History Departmentcontinued on next page

Page 22: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

During the academic year, Clayton Han-son began the first year of his gradu-ate fellowship at the Center for Great Plains Studies. As a Great Plains Fellow, he contributed to the development of

GRADUATE NOTES

Samantha Bryant is currently a third-year doctoral student in the history program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. During the 2014-2015 academic year, Bryant was appointed the web-master for the Virginia Social Sciences Association. In March 2015, she was a recipient of a Mary Lily Research Grant to conduct research at the Sallie Bing-ham Center for Women’s History and Culture at Duke University. She also published a book review in The Journal of African American History forthcoming in the fall of 2015.

Luke Chennell joined the faculty of McPherson College as an Assistant Professor of Automotive Restoration for 2015-16. In addition, he taught at the annual TIIC2 Intercultural Symposium University of Lille-Telecom 1 in Lille, France.

Mikal Eckstrom was a fellow at the American Jewish Archives, a graduate fellow at the Center for Digital Research in the Humanities Graduate, Center for Great Plains Studies and the Marguerite C. and Clare McPhee Memorial Research fellow for spring 2016. His co-authored chapter with Margaret Jacobs on settler colonialism appeared in Why You Can’t Teach U.S. History Without American Indians. He teaches a section of the U.S. History survey course this fall and is progressing on his dissertation.

During the summer of 2014, Tony Foreman attended seven weeks of intensive German language instruction at the Deutsch in Deutschland Institute in Berlin, Germany. He also used the opportunity to conduct research for a

on the valuable contribution of their time, patience, and mentorship this academic year.

Co-chaired by Ryan M. Kephart and Kylie McCormick, the 10th Annual James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities continued to serve as an opportunity for budding scholars in humanities-related disciplines to present and receive constructive feedback on their original research. This year’s theme “Humanity in Conflict” attracted a wide variety of papers, topically focused on the impact of colonialism and military engagements on social and political relations. The HGSA is thankful for the support of Humanities Nebraska, the Of-fice of Graduate Studies, the Center for Great Plains Studies, the Department of History, the Department of Geography, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

As the 2015-2016 academic year ap-proaches, the HGSA aims to strengthen the professional relationship between the graduate organization and faculty committees. Under the leadership of incoming HGSA President Alyson Lomelin, the HGSA will continue coordi-nating engaging workshops thematically centered on historicizing contemporary events, sharpening graduate students’ skillsets as they enter the job market, and facilitating a dynamic intellectual community both inside and outside of the classroom.

Writer: Samantha Bryant

graduate project he plans to publish as an article: “An Imagined Life: (mis)Ap-propriations of Carl Hans Lody, Transna-tional Hero”. He also presented at the thirty-eighth Annual Conference of the German Studies Association. He was part of a session entitled “Transnational Identities: Germans across Borders” and presented his paper, “From Failed Immigrant to the Kaiser’s Great War Hero: The Story of German-American Carl Hans Lody”. He received feedback and met contacts which broadened his research and academic interests.

During the 2014-2015 academic year, Ja-cob Friefeld presented at the Western Historical Association Conference, the American West Center Symposium, The National Council on Public History, The National Association for Interpretation annual meeting, and the Northern Great Plains History Conference. Along with his busy conference schedule,he served as a Graduate Fellow at the Center For Great Plains Studies. He currently has a co-authored manuscript under review at University of Nebraska Press that reas-sesses the Homestead Act, particularly the scholarly emphasis on rampant fraud in the settling of the West. Prior to the start of the 2014-2015 academic year, Jacob attended the 2014 Digital Humanities Summer Institute (DHSI) at the University of Victoria. At DHSI, he completed an extended train-ing session on database development.

Page 23: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

21[ ]

Looking Back, Looking Forward: Native American Art from the Permanent Col-lection, an exhibition of contemporary Native American art in conversation with historic depictions of indigenous people at the Great Plains Art Museum. Throughout the year, he also served as a member of the Western History Associa-tion Graduate Student Caucus Executive Committee. Clayton also completed a digital humanities practicum with the Midwest Archeological Center which fo-cused on the digitization and contextu-alization of transfer print ceramics found at National Park Service units throughout the Midwest region.

Finally, he begins a new appointment with the National Park Service as an interpretation ranger at Mesa Verde Na-tional Park beginning in May 2015.

Jason Heppler entered his second year as the Digital Humanities Specialist for the Department of History at Stan-ford University and completed a major research collaboration with Cameron Blevins, the Geography of the Post. “Crowdsourcing Digital Public History,” co-authored with Gabriel Wolfenstein, appeared in The American Historian and he also started releasing his born-digital dissertation material, Machines in the Valley. He also presented at several conferences and talks, including the Missouri Valley History Conference in Omaha, the d3.digitalhumanities() meetup in San Francisco, the National Council on Public History in Nashville, the American Historical Association in New York, the Western History Associa-tion in Newport Beach, and HASTAC in Lansing. He plans to finish and defend

his dissertation by the end of 2015.

This year Ali Kardatzke held a teaching assistantship and had the opportunity to lecture two times in History 111 courses. She was also awarded the Chancellor’s Fellowship. Additionally, she served on the Rawley Finance Committee and helped write a successful grant proposal to Humanities Nebraska. Ali was elected treasurer of the HGSA for the 2015/2016 year.

Rory Larson attended the Siouan and Caddoan Language Conference in Marksville, Louisiana, held from June 12-14, 2015. He presented a paper How Many’y Phonemes Were There in Proto-Siouan? He also announced and demoed the online appearance this summer of the Comparative Siouan Dictionary, a project begun by a team of Siouan linguists 31 years ago, since the people principally involved in that proj-ect were unable to attend. Finally, Rory spoke a biographical memorial for the late Dr. Mark Awakuni-Swetland of the UNL Anthropology and Ethnic Studies departments.

Catherine Medici-Thiemann will have two essays published in 2015. “Mary Dudley Sidney and Her Dudley Sib-lings,” co-written with Carole Levin, appeared in the Ashgate Research Companion on The Sidneys (1500-1700), Volume 1 Lives and “More Than a Wife and Mother: Jane Dudley, the Woman Who Bequeathed a Parrot and Served Five Queens” will be published in Schol-ars and Poets Talk About Queens. She received the John F. Stover Fellowship from the History department to support

travel to archives in England to complete her dissertation research and the Albin T. and Pauline Anderson Award for excel-lence in European history also from the Department of History. Catherine pre-sented her paper “So Noble a Friend: Lady Mary Sidney’s Favor and Patron-age at Elizabeth’s Court” as part of the Queen Elizabeth I Society at the South Central Renaissance Conference, which won the Medieval and Renaissance Stud-ies Robert Knoll Graduate Paper Award. She also prepared a poster for the North American Conference on British Studies Annual Meeting for which she received a Stern Trust Travel Grant.

Andrea Nichols had a few publications, presented at several conferences, and finished her dissertation research in the last year. In the summer of 2014, Andrea was a contributing editor for Selected Proceedings of the Newberry Center for Renaissance Studies 2014 Multidis-ciplinary Graduate Student Conference (Vol 8). Her co-authored book reviews with Dr. Carole Levin on Judith Rich-ards’ Elizabeth I (Routledge, 2012) and The Oxford Handbook of Holinshed’s Chronicles (Oxford University Press, 2013) appeared in The Sixteenth Century Journal Summer 2014 (Vol. XLV, No. 2) and Spring 2015 (Vol. XLVI, No. 1), respectively. Andrea will also have an chapter “‘I was not I?’: Tracing Represen-tations of Cleopatra in English Drama, 1592-1611” in the collection Scholars and Poets Talk About Queens edited by Carole Levin with Christine Stewart-Nunez, forthcoming from Ashgate’s Queenship and Power series in August 2015.Currently, Andrea is finishing her dis-

Page 24: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

ALUMNIADVISORY COUNCILWELCOMES NEW MEMBERSIn 2012, William Thomas and Lloyd Am-brosius created the UNL History Depart-ment Alumni Advisory Council (“Coun-cil”) to help the Department enhance the graduate and undergraduate student experience at UNL, encourage promis-ing students to major in history, and support fundraising efforts. The Council held its annual meeting on October 24, 2014. The Council created the Peter Maslowski Graduate Student Support Fund (“Fund”), in honor of one of the Depart-ment’s outstanding former faculty mem-bers. The Fund is to support student fellowships, assistantships travel and related expenses. In doing so, the Fund provides the Department a powerful

DON GERLACH AND NATHAN SANDERSON AT ANNUAL ALUMNI COUNCIL MEETING

recruiting tool to attract outstanding stu-dents. Also, the Council has held meet-ings with Department undergraduate and graduate students, offering guid-ance on career opportunities available to those who major in history, and has met with promising high school students to encourage them to major in history at UNL. In the coming years, the Council looks forward to further efforts in these and other areas to support the long-term enhancement and growth of the Department to make it one of the best programs in the Big 10 conference.

The Council welcomes new members: John Belohlavkek, Bradley Hansen, Nancy Stohs, and Don Winslow.

John Belohlavek ‘67 M.A., ‘70 Ph.D., Tampa,FL, Professor of History, Univer-sity of South Florida (retired)

Andrea Bjorkland ‘86, Davis, CA, Professor of Law, University of California, Davis

sertation research: in January she was in New York City at Columbia University; in May and June she was in England, thanks to the financial support of the Department of History and the Medi-eval and Renaissance Studies Program; and in July and August she was in New York City at the Morgan Library and at Princeton University, thanks to the financial support of the 2015 Medieval and Renaissance Studies Dissertation award and a Princeton University Library fellowship.

Brian Sarnacki had an article, “In the Biting Stage”: The 1955 Nebraska Peni-tentiary Riots and Violent Prison Activ-ism) published in Nebraska History. He also presented at HASTAC’s annual con-ference on a panel with Jason Heppler, Andy Wilson, and Rebecca Wingo. This summer he will be attending Humanities Without Walls’ pre-doctoral workshop in Chicago.

Paul Strauss made progress this year on his dissertation “Preaching on an ‘Unholy Trinity:’ Muslims, Jews, and Christian Identity in Early Modern Germany” with the generous support of various fellow-ships. In the summer of 2015 he will end a Fulbright fellowship period at the Herzog-August-Bibliothek in Wolfenbüt-tel, Germany, and will begin an eight month doctoral dissertation fellowship at the Leibniz-Institute for European History in Mainz, Germany. He presented sec-tions of different dissertation chapters at the Renaissance Society of America conference in Berlin, the Workshop on Early Modern German History of the German Historical Institute, London, and the Fellows Colloquium.

2015 ALUMNI ADVISORY COUNCIL

Page 25: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

23[ ]

It is the policy of University of Nebraska-Lincoln not to discriminate based on age, race, ethnicity, color, national origin, gender, sex, pregnancy, disability, sexual orientation, genetic information, verteran’s status, maritial status, religion or political affiliation.

BOOK NOTES

SCHOLARS AND POETS TALK ABOUT QUEENSCAROL LEVIN AND CHRISTINE STEW-ART-NUÑEZ PALGRAVE

CORRUPTING LUXURY IN ANCIENT GREEK LITERATUREVANESSA B. GORMAN AND ROBERT GORMANUNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN PRESS

CHINA’S WAR REPORTERS: THE LEGACY OF RESISTANCE AGAINST JAPAN PARKS M. COBLEHARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS

CIVIL WAR WASHINGTON: HISTORY, PLACE, AND DIGITAL SCHOLARSHIPSUSAN LAWRENCE, ED.UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA PRESS

Jack Campbell ‘72, Santa Fe, NM, Gen-eral Electric (retired)

Don Gerlach ‘54, ‘56, ‘61, Harvard, NE, Professor of History, Univ. of Akron (retired)

Garth Glissman ‘05, Omaha, NE, Attorney at law, Kutak Rock LLP

Bradley Hansen, ‘07, Sioux City, SDAttorney at law

Mary Ann Hanusa ‘87 (M.A.), Council Bluffs, IO, State Representative, Iowa Legislature

James Hewitt ‘54, Lincoln, NE, Attorney at law Benjamin Knoll ‘83, Edina, MN, Chief Operating Officer, Greater Twin Cities United Way

Bruce Pauley ‘61, Windsor, CO, Professor of History, University of Central Florida (retired)

Nathan Sanderson ‘11 (Ph.D.), Pierre, SD, Policy Advisor to the Governor of South Dakota

Karen Starr ‘96, Laguna Beach, CA, Consultant Nancy Stohs, ‘76, Wauwatosa, WI Editor and journalist Natalie Wagner ‘02, Cambridge, MA, Attorney at law, Bank of America

Don Winslow ‘75 (M.A.) Julian, CAAuthor

Page 26: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

John M. Campbell Karen Campbell Raymond P. & Roberta Schmidt

$10,000+

$1,000-$4,999

Patrice M. BergerSharon W. BrownArthur H. HughesAndrew B. KoszewskiThomas P. Lynch & Margaret JacobsKaren A. StarrWilliam G. Thomas

$500-$999

James W. HewittKatrina JagodinskyCarole LevinEllen M. MacekAnn K. Rawley

$100-$499

Robert W. ChernyLaura M. FranzJames W. GoekeSusannah C. HallNancy HayesKathleen A. JohnsonElaine M. KruseVictor A. MartinezPamela J. NicklessAubrey H. PolserAllison SheldonDavid R. SnyderMatthew J. SwansonSusan K. & John Wunder

UP TO $100

DONORS2014-2015

We thank these donors for their generosity and leadership.

JULY 1, 2014- JUNE 30,2015

For corrections or questions regarding the list of annual donors, please contact the University of Nebraska Foundation 800-432-3216

Donations to all Department of History funds.

UPCOMING EVENTSCARROLL R. PAULEY LECTUREDarlene Clark Hine,

Northwestern University

OCTOBER 8, 2015

ALUMNI ADVISORY COUNCIL MEETINGUNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA-LINCOLN

OCTOBER 9, 2015

IN MEMORIUM:MARK GILDERHUS(PH.D. ‘68)

SHAFR Past President (1996) Mark T. Gilderhus died at his home in Fort Col-lins on Thursday, January 22, of cancer. Gilderhus, a professor of U.S. diplomatic history, taught at Colorado State Uni-versity for 29 years, serving as the Chair of the History Department from 1980 to 1993. In 1997, he accepted the Lyndon Baines Johnson Chair in History at Texas Christian University where he served in this capacity until his retirement in 2010. He was the author of numerous articles and books, and described himself as a “scholar of war, politics, and diplomacy.”

John W. ClarkMark & Mikal EckstromMartin A. FehringerGeorge G. GibsonDennis N. HenryStephen S. HilliardNancy KassopFrederick C. LuebkePeter MaslowskiC. McCheyne SwortzelAnne MoreyJoakim NyoniPaul A. OlsonNathan J. ProbascoGerald M. ReaganJulia E. SchleckPamela F. StarrPatricia SullivanAmy TanJon E. UlbrightConnie J. VanDoornCyndi Whitten

Page 27: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

HISTORYhelping

history.unl.edu

Name:Address:City State Zipcode CountryE-mail Phone

I would like my gift to support the following areas in the amounts specified

$ History Department Discretionary Fund (2586) $ James A. Rawley Research Fund (5002), supports research in American history$ Clay Thomas Memorial Endowment Fund (3968), supports research in American history$ Edward L. Homze Fund (10852), supports graduate student research in European History$ Peter Maslowski Graduate Support Fund (26400), supports graduate student research

Campaign Code:

Enclosed is my check for $(Please make check payable to University of Nebraska Foundation)

Please charge $ to my:

VISA Mastercard Discover American Express

Card NumberExp. Date

Signature

Please mail your contribution:University of Nebraska Foundation1010 Lincoln Mall, Suite 300Lincoln, NE 68508

I prefer to make this donation anonymouslyWe invite friends of the department to contribute to an existing fund, or contact the chair about establishing a new fund for a specific purpose.

Page 28: Department of History at University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2014-2015 Annual Report

DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY612 OLDFATHER HALLLINCOLN, NE 68588-0327