Current M.A. Students
This page is intended to give a sense of the range and focus of graduate student research in our department. Current dissertation
titles for Ph.D. students are provisional. You may write to current students care of the Department of History, Herter Hall,
University of Massachusetts, 161 Presidents Drive, Amherst, MA 01003-9312.
Jump to a page:
Current Ph.D. Students |
Current M.A. Students |
Recent Ph.D. Recipients |
Current Public History Students
Roger Adamson:
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Fields: Early American, Atlantic World, Maritime History
Faculty: Bary Levy
Education: B.A., Illinois Wesleyan University (2004)
Ambitions: Complete the M.A. program, pursue a doctorate and teach at the college level.
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Bill Allen:
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Fields: Public History, Early Modern Atlantic World, 20th C. American Cultural History
Faculty: David Glassberg and Marla Miller
Education: B.A., Communication Arts/Theater, Allegheny College (1989)
Interests: Given my past career, I'm still interested in the theater-it's just nice
to be in the audience for a change! I'm also investigating the early American colonial experience,
methods of interpretation for museums and historical sites, historical archaeology, and where to get
the best coffee in the Pioneer Valley...
Ambitions: Currently, an interesting summer internship. Ultimately, a career working
with the interpretation/ curatorial department of a museum or historical site...
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Christopher Fobare:
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Fields: African American history, Southern Africa, and the History of Race
Faculty: Francoise Hamlin
Education: B.A., History, Utica College of Syracuse University
Interests: I am particularly interested in late nineteenth and early 20th C. African
American history. In particular, the role that race and class played in leading the North to turn away
from the "promise" of Reconstruction and accept Southern redemption and creation of Jim
Crow society.
Ambitions: Receive a Ph.D., teach at the college level and write.
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Paul Gard:
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Fields: 16th-17th Century Europe, 17th-18th Century North America; both with an emphasis on religion
Faculty: Barry Levy and Brian Ogilvie
Education: B.A., University of Wisconsin—Green Bay (2006)
Interests: Religious freedom in Europe and America. I am interested in the connections
between the Protestant Reformation in Europe and the religious experiments in the British North American
colonies. Further, I wish to draw connections between that and the work of the 'founders.' I am a firm
believer that a Republic cannot work without freedom of religion/conscience, speech, and the press.
Additionally, I would like to advance a better understanding of American history in K-12 education.
Ambitions: Earn my Ph.D., teach at the university level, and write.
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Sandra Haley:
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Fields: Latin America, Mexico, Central America, Chicano/a History
Education: B.A., Social & Cultural Change in the Americas, University of Massachusetts Boston
Interests: I am interested in exploring identities and their intersections,
including "otherness," gender, ethnicity and nationality.
Ambitions: After completing my Ph.D., it is my ambition to teach and write.
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Jeff Kelley:
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Fields: 19th and 20th C U.S. History
Faculty: Heather Cox Richardson
Education: B.A., History, University of Massachuetts Amherst
Ambitions: I want to teach high school U.S. History.
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Michael Koncewicz:
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Fields: 20th Century U.S., 19th Century U.S., Journalism History
Faculty: Chris Appy
Education: B.A., Cenral Connecticut State University (2006)
Interests: The representation of U.S. foreign policy in the American media and its relationship
to the shaping of public opinion and collective memory.
Ambitions: Eventually get my Ph.D. and teach at a college level.
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Aaron Minton:
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Fields: Early Modern Europe
Faculty: Brian Ogilvie
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Jeffrey Mish:
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Fields: Public History, Eastern European Diaspora, Mongol Empire
Faculty: Marla Miller
Education: B.A., Anthropology, Franklin Pierce College (2006)
Interests: I am interested in the documentary film aspect of Public History, as well as
looking at local/community history pertaining to ethnic islands of various immigrant groups residing
within the United States. In this respect, my primary focus is studying men and women who came from
the partitioned lands of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the late 1800s and early 1900s,
such as Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Poles and Belarusians. I am also intensely interested in the Polonization
of Lithuanians, Ukrainians and Belarusians both within the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the
Hadley, MA area, which includes Amherst (I grew up in Hadley). I have completed a four-hour documentary
film chronicling the history of the Eastern European population of Hadley and how it changed over
time, which aired on the local Hadley television station in August 2006; I also presented my work
on Polonization at the June 2006 meeting of the Hadley Historical Society.
Ambitions: To inform the public about historical topics through the use of film.
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Zamir Nestelbaum:
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Fields: Modern Middle East, 19th C. European History
Faculty: Mary Wilson
Education: B.S., University of Massachusetts (1975), M.D., University of Massachusetts (1981),
M.P.H., University of Michigan (1981)
Interests: To integrate my background in psychiatry with ideological formation in the Middle East.
Ambitions: To continue my studies, to write, and to publish.
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Stephanie Pasternak:
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Fields: Public History
Faculty: Marla Miller
Education:
Interests: My interest in community history began during my years as an ESL teacher in
a public high school in Boston where I worked with immigrant students on community oral history projects
and adapted the Facing History and Ourselves curriculum to address student needs. More recently, my work
with the grassroots women's oral history project, the Valley Women's History Collaborative, as well as
the historical commission in Cummington, Massachusetts has raised for me questions about the role of the
professional historian as an insider or outsider of a community as well as the impact the ethnocultural
background of the community and historian has on the process and outcome of a project.
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Sandra Perot:
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Fields: Early America, Early Modern Europe (transatlantic influences on colonies), and Public History
Faculty: Marla Miller, Jennifer Heuer
Education: A.B., Princeton University, M.A., English Literature and Teaching, San Jose State University
Interests: I focus on the importance of landscape and community in visualizing history,
and more importantly, how to help the public visualize history. I spent several years teaching high school
English and American Literature, though I've always incorporated a cultural approach to teaching literature.
After becoming involved as a guide at the Emily Dickinson Museum in Amherst, I wanted to find out more
about what makes museums work and how to make museums successful.
Ambitions: Having spent a year in New Zealand and Australia and a year in Holland, I
always yearn for new adventures and am looking to do an international internship for my Public History
certificate. Along with traveling, I also enjoy learning Dutch, focusing on my photography, knitting
and playing with my kids.
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Justin Shatwell:
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Fields: Public History
Education: B.A., Northwestern State University of Louisiana.
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Evan Sipher:
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Fields: Public History, Modern U.S., Modern World, Latin America
Faculty: David Glassberg
Education: B.A., History, Tulane University
Interests: I became interested in public history because it seemed like the perfect
program to combine my interests in history and film. I came to the UMass program to learn about
documentary film as well as other forms of multi-media presentation.
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Kyle Stephens:
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Fields: Early U.S.; U.S. religious history; U.S. diplomacy
Faculty: Barry Levy
Education: B.A., History and Religious Studies, University of Alabama
Ambitions: To teach and research at the college or university level.
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Jonathan Sudbury:
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Fields: U.S., Global History
Education: B.A., University of Massachusetts Amherst
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Matthew Watson:
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Fields: Early U.S. Intellectual and Religious History
Education: B.A., History, George Fox University (2003)
Interests:: Education practice and theory, the philosophy of history, literary criticism,
utopianism, Christian humanism, 90's music, Puritanism, revivalism, transcendentalism, the history of
education, exploring New England, ecumenism, fly fishing, writing.
Ambitions: To teach at the secondary or college level.
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Eesha Williams:
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Fields: Recent history of local newspapers and local radio news programs in the U.S.; 20th C. land use in rural Europe
Education: Education: B.A., Community Studies, University of California, Santa Cruz (1997)
Faculty: Laura Lovett
Interests:: hiking, swimming in local rivers, my wife's organic farm, supporting the U-Mass grad student
employee's union and promoting my book: see www.grassrootsjournalism.org.
Ambitions: To be a history professor.
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Brian Eagan, in memoriam (1959-2007)
I've had a lifelong passion for the study of history, but unlike many of my
colleagues I had little academic background in it before I entered the Masters program. I studied at the
theater conservatory (playwriting) at Rutgers University in the late 1980s; several plays of mine have
been produced at various New York and regional venues, most recently at Circle Rep. Lab and Theater Off
Park. I've also been employed in radio for many years, in western Massachusetts and Atlanta, Georgia,
as a program director and producer of syndicated radio shows. Working on these projects in particular
ultimately prompted me to seek formal training in methods of historical inquiry.
Brian Eagan died of congestive heart failure on August 5, 2007. |
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