1356 Campus Drive, East Campus, 224 Classroom Bldg., Box 90719, Durham, NC  27708-0719 | (919) 684-3014 | history.duke.edu                                    vol. 8, May 2026

Dear friends of the History department,

This is a bittersweet memo to write as I step down after serving two terms as Chair of the department.  To rephrase the opening lines of a favorite Victorian novel of mine, the years I served as Chair appear in retrospect to have been the worst of times, and as well the best...  [click for more]

Jacey Anderson, the Bill and Lorna Chafe Postdoctoral Fellow in Oral History and Social Justice, was recently published in the Spring 2026 issue of Montana the Magazine of Western History, a peer reviewed journal edited for public audiences. The article is called “The Train’s in Trouble: The Northern Plains Resource Council and the Fight Against Tongue River Coal Development,” and it tells the story of how residents in southeastern Montana organized and fought for over thirty years to successfully prevent a coal-hauling railroad from being constructed.

John D. French was awarded a Franklin Research Grant in the amount of $4,500 by the American Philosophical Society. His project, called "’Pure Photojournalism’: Event, Truth, and Narrative in Sāo Paulo, Brazil 1979-80," was recently featured in the daily Brazilian newspaper, Diàrio do Grande ABC.

Mélanie Lamotte's new book, By Flesh and Toil: How Sex, Race, and Labor Shaped the Early French Empire (Harvard University Press, 2026) has received many favorable reviews (including this one from the New York Review of Books), and has also been featured on several podcasts (such as this). In April, she was awarded a competitive fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies to complete her second book, Worlds of the Enslaved: A Transoceanic Story of Family, Community, and Economy in the French Empire.

Justin Leroy celebrated the release of his first monograph, The Lowest Freedom: Racial Capitalism and Black Thought in the Nineteenth Century (Columbia University Press, 2026), by holding a conversation about the book with Walter Johnson (Harvard) at Annexe Bar in Durham. Johnson described the work as “a landmark book in both the historical literature on the nineteenth-century United States and thinking about racial capitalism more generally,” and Robin D.G. Kelley (UCLA) called it “an indispensable and dazzling book that will forever change our understanding of modern intellectual history.”

Simon Partner has launched himself into the 21st century with a new Substack, Life Stories From Japan, in which- similar to his books chronicling modern Japanese history through the lives of "ordinary" individuals- he offers a story each week about the life of a Japanese man or woman he thinks deserves to be better known.  Subscribe immediately!

Professor Peter H. Wood, our “retired” early Americanist, has co-authored a research article with Virginia M. Richards that is featured in the April 2026 issue of the William and Mary Quarterly. It is entitled “’To and Fro by Canoo and Boat’: How Enslaved Workers Created the Transport Canals that Launched South Carolina’s Export Economy, 1690-1740.”

A changing of the guard is upon us!  As of July 1, 2026, Sumathi Ramaswamy will, after two eventful terms, step down as Chair of the department.  Tamika Nunley will assume the role of Chair, vacating the position of Director of Graduate Studies (DGS) that she so recently assumed.  Dirk Bonker will (re)assume the role of DGS.  James Chappel also completes his term as Director of Undergraduate Studies (DUS), making way for Gunther Peck as DUS for the 2026/27 academic year.  Jolie Olcott will continue to serve as Associate Chair.  The History department is extremely fortunate and grateful to be the beneficiaries of the service- past, present, and future- of such capable individuals.  These are tumultuous and impactful times in higher education.  It's nice to know we are in good hands!

An Americanist, a Medievalist, and an Asianist walk into a bar...

On April 22, colleagues, family, and friends gathered at Parizade in Durham to "celebrate" the retirement of three beloved faculty members: Prasenjit Duara, John "Reeve" Huston, and Tom Robisheaux.  Bittersweet perhaps, but tributes were made and a fine time was had by all.  The gathering was extremely fortunate to have Professor John V. Brown, Jr., director of Duke's Jazz Program and widely acclaimed bassist, providing music for the evening, accompanied by jazz guitarist and Duke music instructor Kevin van Sant.  Zero complaints and only a few tears!

Ed Balleisen, Duke University senior vice provost for interdisciplinary programs and initiatives, has been appointed provost and executive vice president of academic affairs of the George Washington University, effective July 1.  Ed came to the Department of History as an Assistant Professor in 1997, and became a full professor in 2017.  Despite spending the last decade in the Provost's office, he has remained committed to and deeply involved with Duke History.  Good luck in DC, Ed!

Before riding off into the sunset, Tom Robisheaux took time to publicly reflect on his long personal and professional relationship with Duke University- as a student, an instructor, and alumnus.  And we recorded it!  Click on the image to watch.

A message from the incoming and outgoing (see "Transitions" item above) Director of Graduate Studies, Tamika Nunley:

We are pleased to celebrate several important student achievements this semester. Five PhD candidates successfully defended their dissertations, and four graduate students have passed their preliminary examinations to date. These accomplishments... (click for more]

Emily Gebhardt successfully defended her dissertation, “The King’s Matter: Text, Flesh, and Political Performance in the Reign of Edward IV (1461-1483),” on March 30. 

The Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) awarded Jobie Hill a "Digitizing Hidden Collections: Amplifying Unheard Voices" grant for her 3 year project, Bearing Witness to Enslaved Women and Their Future Issue and Increase in the Massie Family’s 18th- and 19th-Century Reproductive Labor Systems (Bearing Witness).  Jobie's work will bring together and into the public sphere troves of information shedding light on the slaveowning and slave breeding practices that the Massie family systematized into a "reproductive labor enterprise" that was sustained for over a century across multiple plantations and documented more than 1,300 births as "inventory."

Erica Neighbors was awarded the American Association of University Women American Dissertation Fellowship.  “For more than 100 years, AAUW’s fellowships and grants have opened doors for women to lead, innovate, and thrive,” notes AAUW CEO Gloria L. Blackwell. “This funding is not just support—it’s a catalyst for change..."

Seventy-five years after an African-American WWII veteran died after having been turned away from Duke hospital because of his race, Duke Hospital installed a memorial to Maltheus R. Avery  in the entrance lobby to the clinic.  Avery's story had been forgotten outside of his family until its rediscovery by Duke history graduate Spencie Love (PhD '91) while researching her book, One Blood:  The Death and Resurrection of Dr. Charles Drew (UNC Press, 1996).   Duke history graduate (PhD '92) and medical historian Jeffrey Baker (and co-host Dr. Damon Tweedy)  expanded Love's work into a  podcast released in 2025, UNHEALED: A Story of Race, Memory, and a Teaching Hospital.

Vivian Tejada's (PhD, '24) dissertation, "Unfree Soil: Empire, Labor, and Coercion in the Upper Mississippi River Valley, 1812-1861," was awarded the 2026 McNeil Center for Early American Studies Dissertation Prize.  Vivian is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of History at UCLA.

Caroline Garriott (PhD '19) presented her research on Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala (c. 1535–1616), an Indigenous Peruvian intellectual, at the First Colloquium on Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala, held in early March at the University of Florida, Gainesville.  Currently a Public Engagement Coordinator with the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies at The University of Texas at Austin,  Caroline also continues her own interdisciplinary research on colonial Latin American history and visual culture. →