Department of History

Congratulations to Prof. Paul Gootenberg, who has been promoted to the rank of Distinguished Professor by the SUNY Board of Trustees. Distinguished professorships are reserved for scholars who have achieved national or international prominence in their field.

Prof. Chris Sellers has written a online blog entry for the journal Dissent, reflecting on recent industrial disasters in Texas and Bangladesh, and drawing on his edited volume Dangerous Trade: Histories of Industrial Hazard across a Globalizing World.

Prof. Wolf Schafer has won a residential fellowship at the American Academy in Berlin, a center for advanced study in the humanities, public policy, social sciences, and arts. This is the first time a Stony Brook faculty has won this prestigious prize. Prof. Schafer’s winning project, “Finalization and Failure: A Comparative Management Study of Big Weapons Programs in World War II,” will compare the Manhattan Project with equivalent German efforts.

The online journal Common-place recently released a special issue on “Music and Meaning in Early America,” which features the article “Partners in Time” by Prof. April Masten. Drawing on her new research, Prof. Masten discusses affinities between African American and Irish jigs, and the methodological challenges of interpreting the history of dance.

Prof. Sara Lipton acts as consultant for and appears in a new documentary, Jews & Money, released by Emmy-award winning filmmaker Lewis Cohen, which traces the age-old stereotype of the rich Jew, from medieval moneylenders to Nazi propaganda to international capitalism. The first showing is at the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival in February. Future releases include the JCCSF in San Francisco, and a possible New York venue.

Prof. Nancy Tomes appears on This American Life, a weekly radio show that airs on more than 500 stations to about 1.8 million listeners. It is produced by Chicago Public Media, distributed by Public Radio International, and has won multiple major broadcasting awards. It is often the most popular podcast in the country, with around 700,000 people downloading each week. The broadcast will initially air Friday, January 25, and will subsequently be available for streaming and podcasting. Professor Tomes offers her views on the “Petticoat Affair” involving Andrew Jackson’s cabinet members and their wives, as part of the program’s theme, “Surrogates.”