Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Announcement: Teachers' Day, 2014

The History Department is pleased to announce the program for the 2014 Teachers' Day, which will be held on campus on Friday, March 14.  This program will include workshops intended for K-12 social studies educators, including graduates of the History program at Geneseo.  A full program and information on registration can be found HERE.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_wHfhy2hOEgajJVSHAwMHdCOXM/edit?usp=sharing


Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Professor Kathy Mapes Featured on BackStory

Professor Kathy Mapes is one of the featured experts on the NPR broadcast/podcast of BackStory with the American History Guys with a segment on "The Anti-Imperialist Farmer". You can listen to the full show at http://backstoryradio.org/shows/green-acres-2/.  Congratulations!

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

2012-3 Student Awards

In April, the History Department presented a number of excellence awards to Geneseo students.  We congratulate the following award recipients as well as our May 2013 graduates.

Scholarships and Awards
  • Dr. Katherine J. Beck Prize for Outstanding Senior History Major:  Co-Awarded to Justin Shapiro and Cory Young 
  • Senior Award for Academic Achievement:  Lila Chambers
  • Senior Award for Community Involvement:  Kala Destefano
  • Dr. William E. Derby Tribute Endowed Scholarship:  Libby White
  • Dr. Roland R. DeMarco ‘30 Memorial Annual Scholarship:  Todd Christensen
  • Jeremy Byrnes Memorial Annual Scholarship:  Liz Dierenfield
  • Bonnie C. Henzel Memorial Endowed Scholarship:  Split between Cindy Trieu and Brittany Lauda
  • William H. Cook/Walter Herzman Memorial Annual Scholarship:  Split between Paul Kennedy and Clare Flynn
  • James K. Somerville Sophomore History Endowed Scholarship:  Split between Casey Berg and Sarah Nafis  

Paper Prizes

  • Valentin Rabe Award for Best 300-Level Research Paper:  Split between Sarah Ahearn, "Joseph Goebbels and the Rise of the Master of Propaganda" and Alec Michael Tare, "'Knocking off their Irons as Fast as They Could':  Slave Ship Rebellions and the Secret Spirit of the Middle Passage" 
  • William E. Derby Prize for the Best HIST 221 Research Paper:  Split between Adam Camiolo, "The Lion of Munster:  Bishop van Galen Against the Nazis" and Jacob McNabb, "The Cultural Contributions and Benefits of the American Game in Rural America" 
  • Jennifer Wachunas Paper Prize in Women’s History:  Stephanie Tyree, "Quasi-war:  Gender-based Violence Against Civilians During Times of War" 
  • For Best Senior Capstone Paper:  Daniel Leunig, "Hiroshima's Americans:  Understanding Japanese-American A-Bomb Survivors' Interpretation of the Bomb and Their Campaign for Medical Aid, 1945-2012"

Sunday, September 1, 2013

History Department Faculty Awards

The department extends its congratulations to the History Department's three 2013 SUNY Chancellor's Award recipients. Justin Behrend received the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching, Michael Oberg received the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities, and Emilye Crosby won the Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Faculty Service.  The College's press release about this honor is here.

Additionally, Adjunct Lecturer Todd Goehle was awarded the Joseph M. O'Brien Award for Excellence in Part Time Teaching.  Todd is finishing his PhD at SUNY Binghamton this year and has been teaching classes for the department for the past several years (he is also an alumnus of the college).


Professor Emilye Crosvy also won the Oral History Association's 2013 Article Award for her work on "White Privilege, Black Burden: Lost Opportunities and Deceptive Narratives in School Desegregation in Claiborne County, Mississippi.," which appeared in the Fall 2012 issue of Oral History Review.  The College press release about Professor Crosby's award is here.

Thursday, August 15, 2013

Professor William Derby

The department would like to extend its condolences to the family of Professor Emeritus Bill Derby, who passed away on July 26, 2013. Professor Derby retired from a position in the History Department at Geneseo in 1993 after 35 years at the College. By all accounts, he was a remarkable colleague and friend to many in the department and Geneseo community. He will most certainly be missed.

Professor Derby's obituary can be found here. Bill Cook also wrote a very moving reflection on Professor Derby's life for the Livingston County News, which can be found here.


Tuesday, July 23, 2013

History Student Wins Prestigious Liberal Arts Award


The department is delighted to report that recent history graduate Cory Young was awarded the inaugural COPLAC (Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges) David J. Prior Award for "a student whose academic career has been shaped by the transformative power of the liberal arts and sciences experiences at a COPLAC institution".  We hope that you will join us in congratulating Cory. This is wonderful recognition for one of our best students.

The COPLAC press release is here and a YouTube video featuring Cory reading his essay is here.

Undergraduate Research in History


In April, Geneseo hosted the annual West/Central New York Phi Alpha Theta (History Honors Society) conference. Geneseo students represented the College extremely well. Twelve students made presentations and once again our students did wonderful work, winning three of the six best paper prizes (awarded to Lila Chambers, Peter Olsen-Harbich, and Cory Young) and an honorable mention (Michael Tare). Faculty members were generous with their time in preparing our students and serving as panel commentators, and Jordan Kleiman gave a very good keynote on fracking to close out the day. Jim Williams and Barb Rex-McKinney also deserve a lot of credit for putting together the program and making sure that everything ran smoothly.

At GREAT Day, Geneseo's annual on campus showcase for student research, the History Department was also well represented.  35 students gave paper presentations and 15 students displayed posters based on research projects conducted under the supervision of department faculty.  This represents the largest turnout of history projects to date at the GREAT Day symposium

The students who presented at Phi Alpha Theta are listed below along with the titles of their papers. The department is pleased with how well both the conference and GREAT Day went and we hope that you will join us in thanking and congratulating everyone involved.
  • Lila Chambers, Contextualizing “Drunken Paddy”: Origins and Influence in Great Britain and Ireland
  • Kala DeStefano, Political and Social Problems Addressed in French and English 18th Century Literature
  • Peter Olsen-Harbich, The Marlboro Man is the Product: Male Panic in the Golden Age of Patriarchy and the Sale of a Generation
  • Alec Michael Tare, Knocking Off Their Irons as Fast as They Could: Slave Ship Rebellions and the Secret Spirit of the Middle Passage
  • Cory J. Young, “For Family Use”: Slavery in the Letters of Thomas Jefferson
  • Matthew McNeill, The Mystery of the Underground Railroad: How Race has Muddled the Examination of the Institution
  • Clare Flynn, “A People Without Law:” White Insurrectionists in Post-Civil War Texas and the Role of Violence in Society
  • Justin Shapiro, Buried in the Record: Resurrecting Hooker Chemical Corporation’s Love Canal Legacy
  • Adam Reinemann, “It’s Not Me, It’s You!” Draft Offenders, Military Deserters and the Questioning of Citizenship during the Vietnam Era
  • Liz Dierenfield, “Oh, Lord, Don’t Let ’Em Drop That PCB on Me”: African Americans, Religion, and the Origins of the Environmental Justice Movement
  • Kathryn Geen, Wal-Mart in the Not-So-Flat World
  • Rebecca Smarcz, Red Rover, Red Rover, Send Recreation Right Over! …To Rural America

David Tamarin's Retirement


In April 2013, The Lamron profiled David Tamarin as he transitioned into retirement after nearly thirty years at SUNY Geneseo.  The write up is here


David has been with the department since 1984, teaching courses on Latin American history, US-relations with the Caribbean and Latin America, the history of Spain, and Humanities.  Professor Tamarin served as chair for a long stretch in the early 1990s and also was coordinator of the College Humanities program for many years.  For many of us, David has been a terrific colleague and friend and we wish him well as he embarks on this next chapter in his life.