Recent News

On April 13th, UB’s chapter of Phi Alpha Theta, the national history honors society, hosted the society’s regional conference, with over fifty undergraduate and master’s students from colleges and universities in New York, Pennsylvania, and Ontario presenting papers based on their original research.  One hundred and twenty students and faculty attended, held in recently renovated Hayes Hall, including Dr. Clayton Drees, the national president of Phi Alpha Theta.   Dr. Victoria Wolcott, the chair of UB’s history department, presented an illustrated keynote talk, entitled “Roller Coasters and Race in the Postwar City: Crystal Beach, Canada, and the 1956 Canadiana Riot.”

Registration is now open for the Western New York Regional Phi Alpha Theta Conference, hosted by UB's Department of History.  To register, please fill out the registration form.   For participants not affiliated with the University at Buffalo, there will be a $10 registration fee due at the time of the conference. 

Victoria Nachreiner has received a pre-Doctoral Fellowship from the West African Research Association which will allow her to perform preliminary dissertation research this summer in Nigeria. Congrats Victoria!

On March 8-9, 2019, the Graduate History Association held their annual Milton Plesur Graduate History Conference.  The keynote was Dr. Katherine Ott from the National Museum of American History. The Milton Plesur Graduate History Conference is the longest continuously running graduate conference at the University at Buffalo.  It attracts not only students from the United States, but also hosts international students. 

In February 2019, Professor Andreas Daum published a biography of the naturalist Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), an intellectual globalizer who is regarded as one of the last universal scholars.  Daum’s book provides an overview of the transatlantic life, widespread oeuvre and networks of Humboldt.  Today Humboldt enjoys renewed appreciation for his comparative views on the natural environments, culture and history of the various spaces in Europe, the Americas and Asia he visited (C. H. Beck Publishers, Munich).

Congrats to Dr. Mark Nathan for his recent promotion to the rank of Associate Professor with tenure and for the publication of his book, From the Mountains to the Cities: A History of Buddhist Propagation in Modern Korea. Congratulations Dr. Nathan!

Congratulations to PhD Candidate Emily Bowlus-Peck for being accepted into 2019 Residential Summer Institute in the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the Huntington Library. The program teaches the students how to use the Huntington Archives while also conducting research for their dissertations. Congrats Emily!

Andreas Daum, professor of modern history, has been awarded the Humboldt Research Prize by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in recognition of his entire achievements and impact on the historical scholarship.  He will be hosted during the academic year 2019-20 by the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich, with additional support by the Carl Friedrich von Siemens Foundation.

PHI ALPHA THETA CALL FOR PAPER PROPOSALS FROM UNDERGRADUATE AND MASTER’S STUDENTS

PhD Candidate Elizabeth Masarik's article, “Por La Raza, Para La Raza: Jovita Idar and Progressive Era Mexicana Political Maternalism along the Texas-Mexico Border,” was recently published in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly Vol. XXII, No.3, January 2019. Congrats Elizabeth!