Achievement Awards and Essay Contest
2019 - 20 | 2020 - 21 | 2021 - 22 | 2022-23
Each year, the Department of History presents awards for essay composition and scholastic
achievement. Read below for qualifications and application information.
The Annual Scholastic Achievement Awards
Each year the Department presents two academic achievement awards. The Hans Morrow
Junior Award honors the most outstanding junior. The Senior with the Highest GPA Award
honors the graduating senior with the highest cumulative GPA.
The Annual Department of History Essay Contest
Entrants must be declared history undergraduates (teaching major or minor, academic major or minor). Their entries may be from any University of Utah history course but all entries must be typed, double-spaced with proper footnotes and bibliographies. Neither the student's name nor any other identifying information can appear on any page of the essay.
A call for papers will be sent out during spring semester and the winner will be selected shortly after.
2019 - 20
Members of the History Department community,
The end of the academic year gives us the opportunity to recognize the achievements of our students and faculty. For those who are members of the class of 2020, I sincerely congratulate you on your accomplishments! A university degree, whether a BA, MA, MS, or Ph.D. is hard-earned - so many books, articles and sources combed through, so many papers written, so many late nights and early mornings, and so much pizza consumed! Well done!
Members of the faculty also have much to celebrate! We continue to earn internal and external awards that support our scholarship and recognize our contributions to the university; publish monographs, articles, and reports; engage with our communities both near and far, and participate in award-winning teaching at both the undergraduate and graduate level. Thank you all for your commitment to research, teaching, and service.
To students, faculty and staff, thank you for an amazing - and truly unusual - year in the Department of History!
All my best (from six feet away),
Benjamin B. Cohen
Professor and Chair
Devin Halford
Harvard David Hanks Scholarship
Kallin Glauser
James H. and Mary Ann Gardner Scholarship
Nathan Darmiento
John Williams James Family Scholarship
Emma Wyatt
Susannah Topham Memorial Scholarship
Natalie Fullmer
Susannah Topham Memorial Scholarship
Jonathan Beeman
Gregory C. Crampton Memorial Scholarship
Amy Shaw
Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
Michael Anderson-McEwan
Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
Lindsay Pruett
Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
Student Essay Contest Winners
WINNER
Project Title: Animal Portrayal in American Meat Media and Advertising in the Late 20th Century
This innovative essay analyzes visual cultural sources to parse the different ways that the animals we keep as pets and the animals we eat were portrayed in 1990s advertising promoted by the meat industry. It argues that modern advertising differentiated between animal species, with the commodification of animals as meat, on the one hand, and pet-keeping, on the other. The selection committee was especially impressed with the way the author situates the essay within the animal studies literature and positions the research on “speciesism” as cutting-edge scholarship.
"Savannah came into the senior research seminar ready to go on day one. She obviously feels passionately about animal rights, which comes out in the energy she devoted to the seminar and in her lively writing style. Her project deftly weaves independent interpretations of animal representations in various advertising media together with an impressive synthesis of secondary literature from critical animal studies and environmental history. She writes well and is particularly skilled at describing images in a way that brings them to life in the reader’s mind. She then quickly, and seamlessly, toggles to sophisticated analyses of the cultural significance of these images. She convincingly argues the meat-industrial complex mobilized gendered imagery toward specific audiences to distract consumers from the violence inherent in the industrial production, circulation, and, ultimately, consumption of meat and other “non-human animal” commodities in the United States."
- Professor Cody Stephens
HONORABLE MENTION
Project Title: Catholic Response to the AIDS Crisis in Utah
Catholic Response to the AIDS Crisis in Utah” utilizes oral histories to explore the response of Catholic nuns associated with Holy Cross Hospital in Salt Lake City to the 1980s AIDS crisis. It argues that, influenced by their pastoral work and the religious reforms of Vatican II, compassionate nuns cared for AIDS patients in spite of official church doctrine. The selection committee noted the impressive depth and range of research, especially the extensive use of oral histories.
"Juan was a delight to work with. He worked very hard and always took advantage of opportunities to come to office hours. He thought very carefully about both his writing and his research and was always looking for ways to improve on both. He also was incredibly proactive in reaching out to other faculty, especially Professor Beth Clement. Juan ended up producing a very impressive paper that examined the relationship between religious reforms in the wake of Vatican II and care for AIDS patients in Utah. It was a great paper that both looked very carefully at a local situation while also considering its larger import. Having finished this paper just before the impact of Covid-19 significantly altered American life, Juan’s paper also serves as a timely meditation on the importance of compassion during medical crisis."
- Professor Ryan Moran
HONORABLE MENTION
Project Title: Anti-Mothers: Baby Farmers, Infanticide, and True Womanhood in Victorian England
This essay concerns infant mortality rates in Victorian era England. It frames this compelling problem within a larger set of questions regarding motherhood, childcare, and class. The selection committee found the topic deeply interesting, the essay well-crafted, and the argument compelling.
"Eliza is always a pleasure to work with. She chooses her research topics carefully, typically pursuing the historical roots of issues that remain of concern today. In addition, she writes beautifully, ventures down every rabbit hole in pursuit of a deeper understanding of her subject matter, and emerges with a coherent argument. This paper fit perfectly into the class topic "Governing Bodies," as it explored the ways in which the British government attempted to discipline working-class women by policing the childcare arrangements of the poorest members of the population in an age in which abortion was illegal, contraception imperfect, and thus infanticide the only solution for many single mothers."
- Professor Nadja Durbach
Annual Scholastic Achievement Awards
Each year, the History Department awards the junior and senior students with the highest GPAs. Congratulations to the following students, who all received 4.0 GPAs!
JUNIORS
- Elle Moulton, Nathan Darmiento, Jamie Nakano, Luke Seaver, Jordyn Gasper, Terra Tidwell
SENIORS
- Madison Sudweeks, Cameron Christlieb, Alissa Withrow, Natasha Pagel-Aprill, Callie Avondet, Adam Weinstein, Isabella Williams
Excellence in Humanities Award
This award, presented by the College of Humanities, recognizes one outstanding graduate
who has excelled in their commitment to studies in the Humanities. This year's winner
is history student, Maria Stokes.
Maria's dedication to the Humanities is apparent in her work and in her interaction with others. The History Department is proud to have students, like Maria, who question the world around them, and apply what they've learned to broaden their perspectives. We're excited to see what she does next - congratulations Maria!
2020 Phi Alpha Theta Inductees
Phi Alpha Theta (ΦΑΘ) is an American honor society for undergraduate and graduate students and professors
of history. Its mission is to promote the study of history through the encouragement
of research, good teaching, publication and the exchange of learning and ideas among
historians. The society has over 400,000 members, with some 9,000 new members joining
each year through 970 chapters nationwide.
This year, the University of Utah Chapter is proud to induct the following nine members:
Christopher Bird, Tiffany Carter, Benedicte Dansie, Sofia Filip, Kallin Glauser, Kasia Rampton, Diana Rodriguez, Ian Stanford, Maria Stokes
Joseph Stuart is a PhD Student in History and Dean L. May Fellow at the University of Utah. His
previous academic work has explored the connections of race and religion in the formation
of New Religious Movements in the United States and the ways that religions use science
as a means of gaining social acceptance in the United States.
Joseph's accomplishments this year include the following:
- J. Talmage Jones Award of Excellence from the Mormon History Association
- Presented papers at the African American Intellectual History Conference and was slated to present at the Organization of American Historians' Conference
Jeff Turner is a PhD candidate in US History. Jeff studies immigration history, American religious history, Digital Humanities, and history of the American West.
Jeff's accomplishments this year include:
- Publishing "The Push and Pull of Digital Humanities: Topic Modeling the 'What is digital
humanities?' Genre" in Digital Humanities Quarterly
http://digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/14/1/000450/000450.html - Being awarded the The Steffensen-Cannon Scholarship, which was established in 1989 by Hugh Cannon to honor his mother, Ellen Christina Steffensen Cannon. The scholarship enables University of Utah students to pursue excellence in their chosen fields of Education and Humanities, without the burden of employment.
Elizabeth Giraud has penned, "Beyond the Bungalow: the Arts and Crafts Movement in the Salt Lake City School District." It concerns the relationship between arts and crafts philosophy and manual training in the early twentieth-century educational landscape. The arts and crafts movement represented the aesthetic arm of progressive aims to revamp education.
The article is scheduled to be included in the Utah Historical Quarterly's fall 2020 edition.
Matthew Green is currently studying for a History PhD as a Maybelle Burton Graduate Fellow at the University of Utah. His principal area of interest is mountaineering and what its history says about American culture. Matthew's accomplishments this year include:
Fellowships:
- Kathryn Davis Fellow for Peace, Summer Intensive Language Program (Chinese), Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, CA, June 11–August 5, 2020
-
Department of Education Title VI Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) fellowship for Chinese from the University of Utah’s Asia Center for the 2020 summer term
Papers presented:
- “‘Quixotic Dreams’ of Backcountry Skiers and Outdoor Recreation Industry Leaders" - LSU 2020 Graduate History Conference, March 6-7, 2020.
Papers accepted for presentation:
- “‘Quixotic Dreams’ of Backcountry Skiers and Outdoor Recreation Industry Leaders" - Pacific Coast Branch meeting of the American Historical Association, 2020 meeting scheduled for August 6-8th in Portland, Oregon, at Portland State University.
- "Wasatch Range Backcountry Skiing Oral History Project" - Southwest Oral History Association (SOHA) Annual Conference, Las Vegas, September 11-13, 2020
Scholarship:
- SOHA 2020 General Scholarship to attend and participate in the Annual SOHA Conference.
Brandon Clark is a PhD Candidate and an environmental historian of the colonial Americas.
Brandon's accomplishments this year include:
- Contracting with ABC CLIO to write an article for their forthcoming volume on the history of racial violence in America.
- Receiving a fellowship from the Clements Library (Univ. of Michigan) and spending two weeks there, conducting archival research.
- Creating maps for Paul Reeve's recent article “Reconstruction, Religion, and the West: The Great Impeacher Meets the Mormons,” Journal of Mormon History, in press, April 2020.
- Presenting a Work In Progress of my dissertation's introduction to the Tanner Humanities Center.
Shavauna Munster is from Salt Lake City, Utah and received her B.A. in History from the University of Utah in 2015. She is interested in the history of medicine, the body, and legally sanctioned physical punishment. Her current research focuses on connections between medical knowledge and law codes governing implements of discipline in the Middle Ages.
Shavauna's accomplishments this year include:
- Presenting her paper "Riding the Horse: The Punishment of Forgery in the Theodosian Code," Interdisciplinary History Conference at the University of Colorado-Boulder in September 2019
- Beginning an internship at the Utah Historical Quarterly in Spring 2020
- Being hired as the Communications and Marketing consultant and assistant to the Director of the Utah Division of State History
- Starting a Newsletter for the HGSA, serving as the HGSA President 2019-20 and beginning the Grad. Work-in-Progress talks
The History Department is proud to announce that Spencer Woolley has authored two papers that have been accepted to major international conferences this year.
- "Perpetua Memoria: Perspectives on the World History of Memetic Sustainability" was accepted for the World History Association Conference
- "Byzantine Borders in Britain: An Early Medieval
Intellectual History" was accepted for the International Medieval Congress in Leeds, UK.
Emily Larsen is a part-time M.A. student and currently works full-time as the Head of Exhibitions and Programs at the Springville Museum of Art. She is interested in the art and visual culture of the American West, museums, and public history. Her current research projects focus on Utah women artists and dealers c.1890-1950. Emily's accomplshiments this year include:
- Being awarded the Fellowship in Collections Engagement, from the Utah Museum of Fine Arts (UMFA). According to the UMFA website, "The awards are part of a joint project, “Landscape, Land Art, and the American West,” meant to stimulate research, pedagogy and engagement with the collections and resources of the Museum and the Library." Emily's reserach will focus on a different type of women’s labor in “Utah’s Women Artists and the American West, c. 1890–1950.” Her research will fill a significant historical gap in contextualizing the work of artists such as Verla Birrell, Mabel Frazer and Florence Ware, who were among the first women to become fine arts professors at the U.
- Her paper titled, "Negotiating Postwar Mormon Femininity: Verla Birrell, the 'Globe-trotter' of Utah Art", has been accepted to the Mormon History Association Conference.
Julia Huddleston is an M.A. student in U.S. History at the University of Utah where she studies race, gender, and labor in the American West. She earned a Masters in Library and Information Science with an emphasis in Archival Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in 2015.
Julia's accomplishments this year include:
- Being awarded the Fellowship in Collections Engagement, from the Utah Museum of Fine Arts (UMFA). According to the UMFA website, "The awards are part of a joint project, “Landscape, Land Art, and the American West,” meant to stimulate research, pedagogy and engagement with the collections and resources of the Museum and the Library." Her project, “Women’s Work in the American West: Teaching with Primary Sources,” will build a curriculum aimed at undergraduates, dissecting the undertheorized but crucial role of women’s labor to the nation’s program of westward expansion.
- Being awarded the Floyd A. O’Neil Fellowship through the American West Center.
- Julia also plans to pursue her Ph.D at the University of Utah, beginning fall 2020.
Morgan Hardy is a M.A student at the University of Utah where he studies race, identity, and resistance in colonial and Atlantic history, with an emphasis on the early modern French empire.
This year, Morgan's proposal was selected for the 2020 Center for Latin American Studies (CLAS) Pre-dissertation Field Research Grant. The award will assist in travel costs for his research related travel to Martinique.
Cindy Solomon-Klebba is completing her dissertation and teaching in a variety of settings. While writing and research are important, it is her passion for teaching that prompted her to pursue a PhD.
Cindy's accomplishments this year include:
- A University of Utah History Department Travel Grant for research at the Girl Scout archives in New York City
- A Roosevelt Presidential Library travel grant for research in the Eleanor Roosevelt Archives at the Roosevelt Presidential Library in Hyde Park, NY
- The Ramona W. Cannon Award for Graduate Student Teaching Excellence in the Humanities for 2020
Travis Hancock is a PhD student and Maybelle Burton Graduate Fellow. Travis studies 19th-century American colonialism, culture, evangelism, and science from a Pacific perspective.
Travis' accomplishments this year include:
- Being accepted as a 2020 Graduate Fellow in the Summer Institue on Global Indigeneities, hosted by the University of Washington, Aug. 9-15, 2020
- Receiving a Dee Foundation grant to study the Hawaiian language through the University of Hawai'i at Manoa this summer.
Maile Arvin
- published Possessing Polynesians (Duke University Press)
- Huntington Library Short-Term Fellowship
Julie Ault
- Tanner Humanities Center Fellow
- College of Humanities ACLS Incentive Fellowship
Matt Basso
- University of Utah Distinguished Teaching Award
Benjamin B. Cohen
- published An Appeal to the Ladies of Hyderabad (Harvard University Press)
- published The Pleasures At Your Side (Orient Blackswan Press)
Nadja Durbach
- published Many Mouths (Cambridge University Press)
Eric Hinderaker
Rebecca Horn
Colleen McDannell
- Department of History Aileen H. Clyde Professorship
Ryan Moran
Isabel Moreira
- Department of History James L. Clayton Research Professorship
Paul Reeve
- University of Utah Faculty Fellow Award
Greg Smoak
- University of Utah Distinguished Mentor Award
2020-21
Students, Colleagues, and Friends,
A year ago, locked down and working from a home basement office, I wrote a congratulatory message to students and colleagues in the Department of History. While so much has changed, I am still writing from a socially distant basement location. Despite a year of tremendous change, one sentiment remains: to those of you completing your degree this season, my heartfelt congratulations!
History Department Scholarship Awards
Ryan Desmond
Harvard David Hanks Scholarship
James H. and Mary Ann Gardner Scholarship
Emma Fox
John Williams James Family Scholarship
Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
Kauriana Kendall
Harvard David Hanks Scholarship
Jonathan Beeman
Harvard David Hanks Scholarship
Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
Natasha Pagel-Aprill
Susannah Topham Memorial Scholarship
Gregory C. Crampton Memorial Scholarship
Emma Webb
John Williams James Family Scholarship
Lindsay Pruett
Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
Annual Scholastic Achievement Awards
Congratulations to the following students, who all received 4.0 GPAs!
JUNIORS
Emma Webb, Jonathan Beeman, Casey Horvat, Lauren Webb, Dailyn Marrero Brinas, Dustin Khong, Ryan Desmond
SENIORS
Anna Elizabeth Meredith
“Mormon Mothers and Mary Marker: Latter-Day Saint Women and Virtual Space in the Twentieth Century”
This well written and argued essay provides insight into the everyday lives and concerns of Latter-Day Saint (LDS) women during the 1940s and 1950s, as expressed in their correspondence with Mary Marker (pen name of Ramona Wilcox Cannon), the author of the advice column, “Confidentially Yours,” published in the Deseret News for almost thirty years. Based on primary research in the Aileen H. Clyde Twentieth Century Women’s Legacy Archive (Special Collections, Marriott Library), this essay examines the perspectives of LDS women on marriage, divorce, and household and wage labor. In selecting this essay as the winner of the 2021 Department of History Essay Contest, the selection committee noted its clearly articulated thesis; effective use and diverse range of archival sources; engagement with relevant historiographical debates on and theoretical approaches to the study of gender; and strong connections to timely issues related to gender, LDS women, and the work force.
John Flynn
- Digital Matters/American West Center Graduate Fellow for 2020-21
- Digital Matters Research Talks - Fall 2020 Graduate Fellow and Faculty Grantees Projects
- Digital Matters Workshop: "Storytelling through Maps: Data Visualizations and GIS"
Matthew Green
- Department of Education Title VI Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship for Chinese from the University of Utah’s Asia Center
- American Alpine Club Research Grant, 2021
- Western Historical Association Graduate Student Prize, 2020
- Southwest Oral History Association Annual Conference, General Scholarship, 2020
- “A Historical Essay on the Culture and Economy of Utah’s Wasatch Mountain Range from the Long Sixties through the Early Twenty-First Century,” paper presented at the annual meeting of the Pacific Coast Branch of the American Historical Association, September 2020
- “Wasatch Mountain Club (WMC) Centennial Oral History Project,” panel at the Utah State Historical Society’s 68th Annual History Conference, September 2020; I served as the Panel Moderator: https://youtu.be/9rU92xBX6lo
- “‘Quixotic Dreams’ in Outdoor Recreation and in the Pursuit of Oral History,” paper presented at the Southwest Oral History Association Annual Conference, September 2020; Panel Moderator: Professor Andy Kirk, History Department, UNLV.
Elizabeth Anne Giraud
- Johanna S. and Fritz G. Kempe Memorial Scholarship
- Clyde Archive Fellowship
- Elizabeth Anne Giraud, “Finding the Joy in Labor in the Salt Lake City School District,” Utah Historical Quarterly, 88, no. 4.
Morgan Hardy
- Tinker Foundation and Center for Latin American Studies Field Research Grant, Martinique. “the Expression of Resistance: Art, Identity, and Creolité in Modern Martinique.
Emily Larsen
- Helen Z. Papanikolas Award for Best Student Paper on Utah Women’s History for “The Power of Paint: Working Women in Utah’s Art World, c1935-1955” from the Utah Historical Society
- Utah Art Education Association Museum Educator of the Year 2020-2021
- Presented “American Beauty: Art and Americanization in Utah’s Progressive Era Schools” at the History of Education Society Conference, November 2020
Joseph Stuart
- Digital Innovation in Pedagogy Grant, Department of History,University of Utah
- Programming Grant (Rocky Mountain American Religion Seminar),Office of the Vice President for Research Office, University of Utah
- University Teaching Assistantship
- Received a University Teaching Assistantship for 2021-22
- Joseph Stuart and Amanda Hendrix-Komoto, “Race and Gender in Mormonism: 1830-1978,” in The RoutledgeHandbook of Mormonism and Gender (New York: Routledge, 2020), 26-37.
- “Pandemic Pedagogy: Best Practices and Lessons Learned,” Brigham Young University College of Family, Home, and Social Sciences, June 2020
- “Revealing the ‘Invisible’: Historical Training, Practical Skillbuilding,and Process-Based Professional Development,” American Historical Association, Pacific Coast Branch, Portland, OR, August 2020 (COVID- 19)
- “Their Religion Can be Defined as ‘Black Man’: The Nation of Islam’sMessage of Black Masculinity, 1931-1958,” Organization of American Historians, Washington, C., April 2020 (COVID-19)
- “Teaching Joseph Smith’s First Vision to Latter-day Saints and non-Latter-day Saints: Pedagogy, Primary Sources, and Artistic Portrayal,” Church History Symposium (BYU and Church History Department), March 2020
- “The Nation of Islam and Black Masculinity: Respectability, Gender,and Racial Formation,” African American Intellectual History Society, Austin, TX, March 2020
Jeff Turner
- Steffensen Cannon Dissertation Writing Fellowship, University of Utah, 2020-2021
- Public Fellow in Religion and the American West, Acts of Faith: Religion and the American West Exhibit, New-York Historical Society, 2021-2022
- Received the Steffensen Cannon Graduate Fellowship for 2021-22
Megan Weiss
- "What is Grad School Really Like?" Student Panel, American Historical Association (AHA) Virtual Career Development Series, Sep 10, 2020.
- "3D Printing & Scanning for Museums: Benefits, Limits, & Ideas," Utah Museums Association Annual Conference Poster Session, Sep 30-Oct 2, 2020
- Megan Weiss, H20 Today exhibit, in collaboration with the Smithsonian.
Maile Arvin
- "Possessing Polynesians" won honorable mention in the history category of the Association for Asian American Studies 2021 book awards
Matt Basso
- Named Principal Investigator for the National Park Service’s World War II Home Front Theme Study
- Chosen as a Summer Program for Undergraduate Research (SPUR) Mentor (in support of the NPS project)
- Selected for the Aileen H. Clyde Professorship
- The recipient of a Seed Grant from the Office for the Vice President for Research for my new history of the World War II Home Front
Nadja Durbach
- Gourmand Award in the category Food Security (UK) for Many Mouths: The Politics of Food in Britain From the Workhouse to the Welfare State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020)
Susie Porter
- Invited to serve as as editor for a new publishing series in Mexican history, "Confluencias," at University of Nebraska Press
2021-22
History Department Scholarship Awards
Callie Avondet
Harvard David Hanks Scholarship
In my first semester of freshman year, I did a project on education in ancient Rome, and I’ve been hooked ever since. Education systems have an essential role in defining societies, and as a history major, I have the opportunity to develop the critical thinking, writing, and research skills that enable me to better understand and explain these institutions and their influence on students and communities throughout time and space. My current research explores the social studies curriculum at the Hampton Institute during the late 19th century and how it was designed to reinforce white supremacy.
Sascha Darlington
Department of History Tuition Waiver | J. William Gordon Scholarship
Sascha is currently a History major, Gender Studies minor with a specific interest in social history and LGBTQ+ politics. She has made a lifelong effort to expand her studies beyond the recommended course list, exploring different majors and universities, but has found her home at the University of Utah. She is excited to continue investigating for her thesis entitled Trans Brothers and Blood Sisters: How Early AIDS Activism Influenced Intersectional Queer Politics, applying for an internship with a local Salt Lake high school, and looks forward to graduating in Spring 2023.
Emma Fox
John Williams James Family Scholarship | Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
My focus is on the history of American foreign policy, particularly Cold War engagements and covert action in Southeast Asia. My goal is to write public-facing history books that inform the public about foreign policy. I believe the public must know about overt and covertly carried out foreign policy decisions, and we Americans must have an active say in how our government responds internationally on our behalf.
Melissa Howell
Dept. of History Tuition Waiver
I major in Art Teaching and minor in History Teaching. I hope to teach both art and history in a secondary school setting when I graduate. I enjoy studying history because I learn about the resiliency of humans in extreme circumstances or as members of oppressed groups. Learning about how these people survived, thought, and/or persevered is deeply interesting and inspiring for me. My research interests include Native American history in the Western United States and the impact of British imperialism on indigenous populations in Asia.
Elle Moulton
Harvard David Hanks Scholarship | James H. and Mary Ann Gardner Scholarship
I am entering my senior year in the Honors History and Honors Religious Studies majors. I love learning about the past so that I can better understand the present and influence the future in a positive and meaningful way. My research interests lie at the intersection of religion and history, examining religious actors and how they influence or are influenced by other aspects of history. This upcoming year I will be researching Latter-day Saint leadership responses to World War II to explore how Christian theologies have historically interacted with war. I plan to attend law school, using my knowledge and skills acquired in this major to serve immigrants and underserved communities.
Krystal Olvera
Susannah Topham Memorial Scholarship
I am a second-year history major and sociology minor here at the University of Utah. My favorite thing about studying history is that it allows me to look at the world around me more critically. I find that through my studies I can draw connections between current and past events which allows a deeper understanding of our world today. Some of my research interests include Latin American countries in relation to the development of their urban societies as well as the socioeconomic impact on the lives of immigrants from Latin American countries in the US.
Kobe Rathsavong
Gregory C. Crampton Memorial Scholarship
I am double majoring in history, and writing and rhetoric studies. My field of interest in history is around colonialism, imperialism, and post-colonial history. I enjoy learning about history because it’s an important part of the humanities, how we see the past is how we will act in the present, and thus creating the future. Currently, I am researching historiography with a professor and a couple of classmates/friends.
Emma Webb
Hans Morrow Junior Award
I finished my undergraduate degree at the University of Utah in the Fall of 2021 with a major in History and a minor in Italian, and am excited to continue my studies this fall in the Masters of History program. I hope to study the American West and how immigrant communities have shaped the West and been impacted in return. I enjoy studying history because it helps me to understand that we all belong to one human family, no matter the culture, race, or era. I owe a huge thanks to the faculty and staff in the history department who have supported and encouraged me throughout my educational journey! Go Utes!
Lawrence T. & Janet T. Dee Student Travel Award
Kayle Buckley
In support of an exchange program with Yonsei University during Fall 2022 in Seoul, South Korea.
I’m currently a third year History major. I am also majoring in Asian Studies and minoring in Korean, and I enjoy learning about all areas of history but am particularly interested in Asia and the Korean peninsula. By studying history, I have been able to connect more deeply with other cultures and it has strengthened my understanding of other people and the world around me.
EDI Essay Contest
Jules Nielsen
Annual Scholastic Achievement Awards
Congratulations to the following students, who all received 4.0 GPAs!
JUNIORS
Ryan Desmond, Dorothy Bailey, Dailym Brinas, Grace Edwards, Lindsay Pruett, Mckenna Dungan, Aidan Mcmillan
SENIORS
Annual Essay Contest Winners
Jessica Guynn
“Helpmeets in the Garden:
three early witnesses of the Spanish Conquista and their narrative of indigenous character
as justification for Catholic patriarchism in the Americas”
In “Helpmeets in the Garden: three early witnesses of the Spanish Conquista and their narrative of indigenous character as justification for Catholic patriarchism in the Americas,” Jessica Guynn compares the written accounts of three 16th-century conquistadores, Bartolomé de Las Casas, Gonzalo de Oviedo, and Alvar Cabeza de Vaca. All three sent written relaciones back to their Catholic monarchs, describing the distant lands in their possession. They detailed interactions with indigenous people, whose essential nature, character, and legal status were under debate. Were the “Indios” simple, conniving, or admirable? Most importantly, could they be transformed into a Christianized workforce, a critical component of the Spanish justification for the American conquest. Jessica’s evocative account discloses how each conquistador had a radically different experience with indigenous forced servitude, which they nevertheless all transmuted into a conviction that Spanish aims were righteous. The selection committee especially appreciated how Jessica shed light on the interconnected lives of indigenous people and Spanish intruders, whose relationships were often more than that of usurper and victim, making the ultimate consequences of Spanish colonization all the more tragic.
Emma Webb
"Empress Theodora: Defender of the Weak"
In her insightful exploration of the “Metanoia” monastic retreat, Emma Webb’s essay “Empress Theodora: Defender of the Weak” evaluates the social policy of a sixth-century Byzantine Empress. Theodora aimed to provide a place of penitential rehabilitation for prostitutes. Their needs were uniquely understood by an empress who herself had risen from sex work and who was able to envisage and implement a program aimed at providing these women with protection and relief. As Emma explains, Theodora understood that poverty was the root cause for the sex trade and the trafficking of children. Yet there were troubling aspects to this social “rescue” also. The committee was impressed by Emma’s use of the primary sources to examine the lives of those who benefitted from, and endured, Theodora's enforced imperial charity.
Achievements
The achievements of History undergraduate students as recognized by outside organizations
Students elected to the Phi Beta Kapa Society
Morgan Robinson, Nelson Sing, Lily Weeks
Matthew Green
- 2022-23 Marvin J. Aston Scholarship, awarded to one graduate student in the University of Utah College of Humanities and one in the David Eccles School of Business. The scholarships are administered by the Office of Alumni Relations in conjunction with the Veterans Support Center ($5,000).
- Presented “First Tracks in the Greatest Snow on Earth: Wasatch Range Backcountry Skiing” on a panel that I helped to organize, “The Evening Radness in the West: Outdoor Recreation and Lifestyle Sports in the Interconnected West,” at the annual meeting of the Western History Association in Portland, Oregon, October 2021.
Summer 2021, Middlebury Chinese School
- Kathryn Davis Fellowship for Peace, a fully-funded fellowship for up to 10 exceptionally qualified individuals: https://www.davisfellowsforpeace.org/
- Department of Education Title VI Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship for Chinese from the University of Utah’s Asia Center: https://asia-center.utah.edu/flas/
- “Most Improved Student Award” in the Level 2.5 class
Jessica Guynn
- 2022 Tinker Pre-dissertation Field Research Grant
Travis Hancock
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Award:
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Dissertation Travel Grant, University of Utah Department of History, fall 2021
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- Publications:
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Travis D. Hancock, “The Many (De)colonial Lives of Kāpena George Gilley,” Pacific Historical Review (forthcoming; accepted 1/24/2022)
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Projects:
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Project managed exhibit Remembering Queen Liliʻuokalani at Washington Place, spring 2022, as curator of Washington Place with the State of Hawaiʻi Department of Accounting and General Services, and in collaboration with the Hawaiʻi Office of the Governor.
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Joseph Stuart
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Invited Lectures:
- “Race and Religion: Building Bridges with Who? And to Where?,” Utah Valley University
- “Critical Contexts for the Genesis Group’s Founding,” Sema Hadithi: African American Heritage and Culture Foundation
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Conference Presentations:
- “A Religion for Black Men: Warith Deen Muhammad, Louis Farrakhan, and the Nation of Islam, 1976-1981,” American Society for Church History, New Orleans, LA
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Published Essay:
- 2022 “Bodily Autonomy: Ivermectin, Racial Separation, and the Strange Bedfellows of American Religions,” Religion and Politics
- Accepted a postdoctoral fellowship at BYU’s Neal A. Maxwell Institute
Garret Shields
- 2022 Tinker Pre-dissertation Field Research Grant
EDI Essay Contest
Eliza MCKinney
Eliza McKinney is an MA student studying US History with an emphasis in gender and sexuality. Eliza enjoys finding the unexpected in the archives and sharing marginalized histories. They are currently working on projects about student activism at Indian Boarding Schools, political quilting and the AIDS Memorial Quilt, and lesbian community in 90s Salt Lake City.
Julia Ault
- Julia E. Ault (2021). Saving Nature under Socialism: Transnational Environmentalism
in East Germany, 1968-1990. Cambridge University Press. Published, 09/09/2021.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/saving-nature... - College of Humanities international Travel Grant Award 2022-2023
Matt Basso
- “The Many Wars of Buffalo Bill (1944),” Journal of the West Vol. 6, No. 3 (Summer 2021), 48-59.
- “Settler Masculinity and Labour: The Post-Pioneer Gender Order and New Zealand’s Great Strike of 1913,” Settler Colonial Studies Vol. 11 No. 2 (2021), 173-196.
- 2021-2022 Aileen Clyde Professorship
- A New History of the World War II Home Front, University of Utah VP for Research (TRANSFORM) Seed Grant, 2021-2022.
- Digital Matters Faculty Grant for Using Digital Tools to See the World War II Home Front in a New Way, 2021-2022
- Sabbatical Award, Fall 2022
- Faculty Fellow, University Research Committee, Spring 2023
Elizabeth Clement
- 2022-23 Aileen H. Clyde Professorship
- 2022 Calvin S. & JeNeal N. Hatch Prize for Teaching
Benjamin Cohen
- 2022-2023 American Institute of Indian Studies Fellowship
Eric Herschthal
- Eric Herschthal (2021). The Science of Abolition: How Slaveholders Became the Enemies
of Progress. Yale University Press. Published, 05/25/2021.
ShawnaKim Lowey-Ball
- 2022 Early Career Teaching Award
- Dee Council Fellow
Rachel Mason Dentinger
- 2021-2022 Environmental Humanities Research Professorship
- 2022-2023 Tanner Center Fellowship
Colleen McDannell
- James L. Clayton Award
Isabel Moreira
- Appointed University of Utah Distinguished Professor
Danielle Olden
- 2020-2021 Faculty Teaching Award for Excellence in General Education
- 2021 Presidential Leadership Fellowship
Susie Porter
- 2022 University of Utah Presidential Public Impact Scholar Award
- Susie S. Porter, De angel de hogar a oficinista: identidad clase media y conciencia feminine en México, 1890-1950 (El Colegio de Michoacán Press, 2021)
- Susie S. Porter, Kimberly Schmit, and Kara Byrne, Building Community: University Neighborhood Partners Curriculum (2021)
- Susie S. Porter,“Hacia una historia del acoso sexual en el ámbito laboral, ciudad
de México, 1920-1950,” Korpus21, vol. 2, no. 4 (2022): 117-132.
Paul Reeve
- Fellow of the Utah State Historical Society, Board of State History, Utah Division of State History, 2021
- Sons and Daughters of the United States Middle Passage, Elijah Able Service Award, Century of Black Mormons database, May 2021
- “‘I Dug the Graves’: Isaac Lewis Manning, Joseph Smith, and Racial Connections in Two Latter Day Saint Traditions,” Journal of Mormon History, 47, No. 1 (January 2021), 29-67, https://doi.org/10.5406/jmormhist.47.1.0029
Greg Smoak
- 2020-2022 President of National Council on Public History
- Gregory E. Smoak (2021). (2021). Western Lands, Western Voices: Essays on Public History in the American West.
University of Utah Press. Published, 08/01/2021.
https://uofupress.lib.utah.edu/western-lands-weste... - College of Humanities International Travel Grant Award, 2022-2023
Jessica Brumbaugh
- 2021 College of Humanities Staff Excellence Award
- 2021, Masters of Public Administration, Certificate in Gender Studies
Shavauna Munster
- 2022 Marcus Garvey Black Star Excellence Award
2022 - 23
Isabelle Dansie | J. William Gordan Scholarship
Beau Starbuck | Gregory C. Crampton Memorial Scholarship
I am a History major with aspirations to continue my education in law school. I love studying history, as it is super important to understand the past to better our future. I enjoy studying Victorian Britain and the history of the social body.
Callie Avondet | Harvard David Hanks Scholarship
Callie Avondet is a third-year honors history and sociology major. Her research interests include Black history of education and student protests. She views history as an essential tool for understanding current institutions and attitudes.
Alorah Francis | James H. and Mary Ann Gardner Scholarship
I'm majoring in history because history, and my passion for it, is built on the stories of individuals. Since I was a child, I have been fascinated with stories, and at the end of the day, my love of stories within and without history comes from my fondness for people. I am interested in researching the history of the U.S. incarceration system and how systemic injustices within this system effected, and continue to effect, the lives of incarcerated individuals.
Hannah Salas | John Williams James Family Scholarship
Hannah Salas is a rising senior at the University of Utah, and is double majoring in Musical Theatre and History. She loves studying history for the same reason she loves studying musical theatre: there are millions of stories to be learned and shared with the world, and it is our job as historians to discover, research, and preserve those stories for future generations. She believes that it is incredibly important to learn about the past to inform our decision-making in the present, and to realize that historical events have major consequences on our lives to this day. She is interested in researching Europe’s involvement in World War II, particularly concerning Holocaust resistance efforts in Germany and the effects of Fascism and the Holocaust on the average German citizen, both Jewish and non-Jewish. She is also interested in researching the intersection of Musical Theatre and History, particularly concerning how events like the Holocaust are remembered through art forms like theatre.
Lindsay Pruett | Susannah Topham Memorial Scholarship
I am majoring in History with a minor in Art History. I enjoy studying cultural practices and how they have developed throughout history, particularly historical art and literature. My honors thesis research focuses on sexual violence in ancient Rome, its relation to the founding myths of Rome, and what it reveals about the values of Roman society.
Emma Bernards | History Department Tuition Waiver
Alexander Jolly | History Department Tuition Waiver
I am Alexander Jolley, and I am pursuing a double major in History and Geography with a minor in Creative Writing to eventually become a Curator of Rare Books. What I love most, and how these two majors complement each other beautifully, are people, the unique human experiences, and the world we inhabit. I am most interested in research and writings on beliefs, practices, experiences, and endeavors that put into perspective the space and area in which they occurred. Books, especially, are a favorite cultural object of mine, as they are a time capsule into the lives of those who worked to make them possible; that is why my opportunity to work at the Rare Book Office is so meaningful to me.
Rachel Hansen | History Department Tuition Waiver
Department Essay Winners
Natasha Pagel-Aprill
I recently graduated with a double major in History and Environmental & Sustainability Studies. Studying history has helped me understand that divisions and constructs we view as innate to our existence have been reshaped in countless ways over time. History denaturalizes the present, allowing you to imagine new ways of being while understanding the legacies of the past that we bear. My areas of interest include medical and environmental history, the origins of professionalization, and print culture. I am currently working for the Forest Service researching dryland ecosystems and hope to attend law school.
Dylan Fawson
Highest GPA
Callie Avondet, Elle Moulton, Hannah Salas, Ryan Desmond, Jonathan Beeman, Breanne Bailey, Mel Palmer, Aidan Mcmillan, Brooke Newson,
Alorah Francis, Brooke Newson, Emma Bernards
