Monday, July 2, 2012

Academic Showcase

Congratulations to WOU History undergraduate seniors and graduate students for your presentations at Academic Showcase on May 31.

Western Oregon University Senior History Thesis Students, May 31, 2012. Gregory Garcia is not present.

Western Oregon University History MA Seminar Students, May 31, 2012.



Friday, April 13, 2012

Deadline extended for History Department Research Grant

Students enrolled in HST 499W Senior Thesis in Spring 2012 are eligible to apply for the History Department Research Grant. Guidelines for application are located on the departmental website and the deadline has been extended until Friday of the 3rd week of class for this term only. Please contact the department chair with any questions. Completed applications should be submitted to the department chair, Dr. Max Geier

Phi Alpha Theta History Honor Society Conference


Current and former undergraduate history students, Greg Garcia and Sarah Berry, and graduate students William "Duke" Morton, joined Dr. John Rector in representing the WOU chapter of the History Honor Society Phi Alpha Theta at the Phi Alpha Theta Regional Conference in Spokane April 12-14, 2012, where they were hosted by Whitworth University. Students who traveled to this event received travel support from the Western Oregon University Foundation and the Associated Students of Western Oregon University for this activity.

Collaborative arrangements with cooperating partners

The following cooperating partners in the historic resources community provided opportunities for history undergraduates to apply their skills in public venues:

Oregon State Archives
A blended group of undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in Dr. Max Geier's HST 406/506 Archival Science course in Winter 2012 completed practicum work individually and collaboratively under the direction of Layne Sawyer, assessing, arranging, and describing State Department of Education records dating from the mid-20th century at the Oregon State Archives. Also advising and conducting workshops with students in this collaborative effort with Layne Sawyer at the Oregon State Archives were Erin Passehl, who directs the Straub Archives at WOU's Hamersly Library, and Willamette University Archivist Mary McRobinson, and Oregon State Archivist Mary Beth Herkert.

Willamette Heritage Center, Salem, Oregon
Jennifer Ross, a senior in history, secured a competitive, paid internship with the Willamette Heritage Center in Salem for Winter 2012. As a research intern serving under the direction of Curator and Museum Director Keni Sturgeon, Ross researched  the Lives of Willamette Valley Women  from the 1870s-1890s. The WHC is in the process of reinterpreting its three Historic Houses, and information gathered through this research will be used to develop two new hands-on history galleries in these houses.

Graduate Students William "Duke" Morton, Hannah Marshall, and Jeffrey Sawyer worked with Dr. Max Geier, arranging and completing internships at Willamette Heritage Center under the direction of Curator and Museum Director Keni Sturgeon to plan and edit the first edition of Willamette Voices, a new, serial publication focusing on the history of the mid-Willamette Valley. This ongoing project is currently in the production phase, with the first volume due to be published in Spring 2012, including approximately 10 different articles and authors of regional interest, centering on the theme of Public Spaces, and a second volume is already in the works for release  later this Fall. The history department and the WHC expect this partnership to provide ongoing and long-term opportunities for editorial internships for both undergraduate and graduate students.

Undergraduate history major, Zachary Jones and other undergraduate history students worked with Dr. Jensen preparing materials for the  Documents Project on the Century of Action website, featuring materials on the history of the 1912 campaign woman suffrage campaign in Oregon, and they presented their work at the Willamette Heritage Center in February in a panel presentation that was part of the speakers series at the WHC scheduled to coincide with the special winter exhibit, Willamette Women: Our History is Our Strength, featured at the Willamette Heritage Center in Salem, January 20 - March 10, 2012 http://www.willametteheritage.org/events_and_programs.html
Two recent History M.A. graduates Samantha Reining and Austin Schulz and three current History M.A. students Toni Rush, Jeffrey Sawyer and Diane Huddleston presented material this past October (2011) that they had developed for their Spring 2011 projects in Dr. Max Geier's HST 620 Seminar: Constructing Murder. Their presentations were part of the Willamette Heritage Center’s 2011 Fall Speaker Series in Salem. Samantha Reining (M.A. 2011) presented "1844 Oregon Territory: Murder and Race Relations"; Austin Schulz (M.A. 2011) presented "Interpreting Guilt: The Oregon Supreme Court Case of Foot You"; Diane Huddleston (current M.A. student) presented "The Case of Emma Hannah: From Prison to Asylum"; Jeffrey Sawyer (current M.A. student) presented "Society's Reaction to the Harry Tracy Murder Spree"; and Toni Rush (current M.A student) presented "Interpreting Horror: Oregon News and Lynchings Between 1900-1910." We congratulate these students on their fine work and presentations to our regional heritage community through the speaker series.

 
Century of Action: Oregon Women Vote, 1912-2012
Zachary Jones, an honors student majoring in History with a minor in Gender Studies, joined Dr. Kimberly Jensen and others who testified at a legislative hearing at the State Capitol in Salem. The hearing was for Senate Concurrent Resolution 204 supporting the commemoration of the centennial of woman suffrage in Oregon.  Zachary Jones' testimony built on his work in the junior honors seminar that Dr. Jensen offered last year, in collaboration with community partner Century of Action: Oregon Women Vote, 1912-2012. Jones' work in that seminar also included a contribution to the documents projects posted at www.centuryofaction.org -- writing on Everybody's Equal Suffrage League http://centuryofaction.org/index.php/main_site/document_project/uniquely_oregonian_everybodys_equal_suffrage_league_in_1912.
Jones was also part of a student team in Dr. Jensen's History 405C Gender Issues in History that interviewed Secretary of State Kate Brown as part of the Century of Action project


New Courses and Program Changes


With the addition of Dr. Patricia Goldsworthy-Bishop to the faculty last Fall, the History Department made major changes to its course offerings and program requirements during the 2011-12 academic year, integrating Dr. Goldsworthy-Bishop's specialty courses on North Africa and European Colonialism in North Africa into the new course catalogue for 2012-13.

These changes included an adjustment to the introductory survey offerings which may affect some program plans. HST 101, 102, and 103 Western Civilization will no longer be offered as an LACC sequence. All history majors should plan to complete the HST 104, 105, 106 sequence. For those who have already begun the Western Civ sequence, either at WOU or elsewhere, the following substitutions will apply:  HST 104 may be substituted for HST 101, HST 105 may be substituted for HST 102, and HST 106 may be substituted for HST 103 to satisfy the introductory sequence requirement.

2012 Senior Thesis projects and presentations


Senior Thesis projects are underway in Dr. Bao Hua Hsieh's HST 499 Senior Seminar for Spring 2012. Graduating seniors participating in this process will showcase their work with initial public presentations at the campus-wide Academic Excellence event in late May, and more comprehensively at the department's end-of-year gathering in early June.