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Degrees

  • B.A., University of Michigan 1988
  • M.A., University of Michigan 1993
  • Ph.D., University of Michigan 2000
Areas of Interest

My research centers on the cultural history of France in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. I’ve written on crime and catastrophe in the French press of the late nineteenth century, ideas of the mass public, the debates surrounding the anarchists of Paris in the 1890s, and ideals  of the press as fourth estate. I’ve also spent some time investigating the history of emotions, visual culture, early detective fiction and the anti-detective tradition, and the public execution in France. I’ve worked with students on aspects of local history, founding the Wooster Digital History Project.

Courses Taught
  • FYS: The Witness in History
  • Introduction to History: Crime & Punishment in Historical Perspective
  • The Making of the Contemporary World (team-taught)
  • The Craft of History: The History of News
  •  History Workshop: Historical Documentary Filmmaking
  • Europe, 1890-1945: The Experience of History
  •  Europe, 1945 to the Present: Film and History
  • Modern France: Revolution, War, and Empire
  • History Colloquium: The World in 1900, A Global History
  • History Colloquium: War and Memory in Contemporary Europe
  • TREK Documentary Filmmaking in Buenos Aires
Publications
  • “The Unruly Emotions of the Execution Crowd and its Critics in Late Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century France.” Cultural History (April 2019)
  • “The Myth of the Fourth Estate.” Lapham’s Quarterly (2012)
  • “How to Make an Anarchist-Terrorist: An Essay on the Political Imaginary in Fin-de-Siècle France.” Journal of Social History (Winter 2010)
  • “The Mass Public in France.” The Crowds Project, directed by Jeffrey T. Schnapp, Stanford Humanities Laboratory (2005)
  • “The Flâneur, the Badaud, and the Making of a Mass Public in France, circa 1860-1910,” American Historical Review (February 2004)
Professional Affiliations
  • American Historical Association
  • Society for French Historical Studies
  • Société pour l’histoire des médias
  • International Society for Cultural History
  • International Association for the History of Crime and Criminal Justice
  • Urban History Association
  • Amis de l’Académie Tunisienne des Sciences, des Lettres, et des Arts “Beït al-Hikma”