History and Classics
Passionate faculty. Incredible students.
These are essential ingredients for the best history and classics departments — just like ours. Our faculty members know their way around the world, from the Americas and Europe to Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. They’re also experts in their fields, specializing in everything from the Harlem Renaissance and the Reformation, slavery and samurais, women and gender in antiquity, and much more.
Both inside and outside of the classroom, our students are dedicated to the study of the events and cultures that have shaped our world, from the post-Civil War Reconstruction Era to the decolonization and rise of nationalism in 20th-century Africa. They have gone on to become educators, lawyers, CEOs, community organizers, diplomats, and peacemakers.
Away from the classroom, internships and our history club bring history lessons to life. Our annual Maymester course, which has taken students to Germany, Poland, Hungary, England, Ireland, and Japan in the past several years, offers the opportunity for students to be fully immersed in the materials they study. So, whether you want to learn about the world from our lecture halls or experience it firsthand, we want you to take your journey with us.
What’s New In Our Department?
- We are pleased to announce Dr. Colin Jaundrill as the new Chair of the Department of History & Classics (2024).
- Dr. Karen Holland and Dr. Osama Siddiqui recently led the Spring 2024 Civ in London program. Catch up with their travels with their students at the Civ in London Blog.
- The Department of History and Classics has received a generous gift from the family of Andrea Traietti ’21, allowing us to offer mini research grants to our students for Honors Thesis Research and other Special Projects.
Faculty Books, Released 2023-2024
Recent Faculty Awards and Recognition
Banking on Slavery: Financing Southern Expansion in the Antebellum United States
Winner, Ralph Gomory Prize
Finalist, Hagley Prize
Winner, SHEAR Book Prize
A Constitutional Culture: New England and the Struggle against Arbitrary Rule in the Restoration Empire
Winner, Colonial Society of Massachusetts’ John Winthrop Prize
Recipient, American Council of Learned Societies Awards Project Development Grant for his project “A Science of Society: Indian Economic Thought in the Age of Liberalism and Empire”
Recipient, 6-Month Career Enhancement Fellowship from the Institute for Citizens & Scholars for her project “Reel Freedom: Black Film Culture in Early Twentieth Century New York City”
Recipient, Silas Palmer Fellowship, Hoover Institution Library & Archives, Stanford University
Recipient, Herbert W. Blakely Endowed Award from the Center for Western Studies for his paper, “‘Tyranny Breeds Tyrannicide’: Soup & Anarchy in 1916 Chicago”
Recent Faculty Publications
Faculty News
Dr. Jessica Blum-Sorensen and Dr. Jennifer Illuzzi have received a Collaborative Interdisciplinary Research Award for 2024-2025 to fund the research for their upcoming project, entitled: “Witch Hunt: Witchcraft and Social Control From Antiquity to the Present.”
Dr. Adrian Weimer has been awarded a John Carter Brown Library Fellowship to work on her most recent project, “Deer Island: ‘Praying Indians,’ Law, and Betrayal in Wartime New England, 1665-1685.”
Dr. Jessica Blum-Sorensen and Dr. Francesca Silano were both awarded 2024 Arts and Sciences Summer Scholars grants to support their current projects–Dr. Blum-Sorensen for “Burning Down the House: Ambition and the Family in Imperial Rome,” and Dr. Silano for “The Battle for Russia’s Souls: Patriarch Tikhon, The Russian Orthodox Church, and the Early Soviet State (1865-1925).”
Student News
History minor Abby Brockway ’24 talks about her time at Providence College and her future plans in an article from Providence College News.
History major Rob Livingston ’26 documented his experience on this year’s Maymester trip to Korea, led by the History & Classics department’s Dr. Margaret Manchester and Dr. Colin Jaundrill.
History major Colin Prancl ’24 incorporated his film minor to create a visual project for his internship at the Blackstone River Valley National Historical Park.
History major and Classics minor Carley Medeiros ’24 received a Veritas Undergraduate Research Award to complete her thesis. Medeiros was also a Father Smith Fellow in summer 2023, allowing her to travel to Sydney, Australia, where she was a teaching assistant at a Catholic school. She was highlighted on Providence College’s Instagram over the winter.
History major Samuel Edney ’27 spent the summer attending an Archaeological field school in Fairbanks, Alaska, operated through the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where he learned the basics of Archaeological excavation and theory through fieldwork in the Chena Townsite, a gold rush mining town close to Fairbanks that was abandoned. Read Edney’s reflection on the experience here.
