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.

Recent Publications and Events

The department congratulates two colleagues on recent publications.  In March 2013, Tze-ki's Hon's monograph entitled Revolution as Restoration: Guocui Xuebao and China's Path to Modernity, 1905-1911 was released by Brill. The publicity page is available here.

Additionally, Justin Behrend's article entitled "Facts and Memories: John R. Lynch and the Revising of Reconstruction History in the Era of Jim Crow" appeared in March in the Journal of African American History (table of contents here).

The spring 2013 semester saw a number of Department events of note:

In January and February, Professor Justin Behrend organized a series of college -ide events to mark the anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation.  The "Emancipation at 150" programs included a faculty roundtable (featuring Professor Behrend, Professor Cathy Adams, Professor Rose Marie Chierici from the Anthropology Department, and Professor Alice Rutkowski from the English Department) and a keynote address by Professor Steve Hahn from the University of Pennsylvania.  The College's press release on the "Emancipation at 150" events is here.

On April 1, 2013, Professor Emilye Crosby brought Rita Schwerner Bender and Bill Bender to campus as part of the College's annual Martin Luther King Day Commemoration events.  The Benders delivered a keynote address on "The Deliberate Denial of Education" for African Americans, historically and today, met with many students, and visited several classes. More information about the Benders and Geneseo's King Commemoration is available here: http://mlk.geneseo.edu/

 Professor Steve Hahn addresses the College as part of the "Emancipation at 150" events organized by Professor Behrend.

Students work with Bill and Rita Bender and Professor Crosby as part of the College's annual Martin Luther King Day Commemoration events.