Department Faculty

"My graduate work is in latter 19th century and 20th century American intellectual history with a focus on the post-Civil War South. My dissertation examines the writings of a noted sociologist and race relations leader who taught at the University of North Carolina during the Depression-World War II years. In addition, one of my majors in college was economics, and I greatly enjoy the study of economic history and the history of economic thought. I am intrigued by the United States during the Gilded Age and the early 20th century as the nation struggled mightily with the forces of industrialization and modernization. This same time period in Russia and Soviet History has also been of considerable interest—as the Tsarist regime and the Bolsheviks devised their own variants of statist industrialization and development. In recent years my focus has shifted to the study of big business in America—more precisely, popular and political attitudes towards vast corporations and the government's treatment of monopolies. One such example is looking more closely at the work of organizations agitating against Wal-Mart Corporation. On several occasions while at Penn State I have taught a seminar on the history of antitrust. I also teach the American Business History and the Soviet History courses. I serve as the head of the History Department's Undergraduate Intern Program. So if you are interested in doing an internship (which garners 400-level History credit) I would welcome meeting with you and trying to work out such an internship."