History Awards
Julia Ault
Saving Nature under Socialism:
Transnational Environmentalism in East Germany, 1968-1990
Cambridge University Press. Published, 09/09/2021.
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
Ben Cohen
2022-2023 American Institute of Indian Studies Fellowship
Eric Herschthal
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
De angel de hogar a oficinista: identidad clase media y conciencia
feminine en México, 1890-1950 (El Colegio de Michoacán Press, 2021)
Kimberly Schmit, and Kara Byrne, Building Community:
University Neighborhood Partners Curriculum (2021)
“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
Greg Smoak
2020-2022 President of National Council on Public History
Western Lands, Western Voices: Essays on Public History in the American West.
University of Utah Press. Published, 08/01/2021.
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
Graduate Student Awards & Recognitions
Matthew Green
2022-23 Marvin J. Aston Scholarship
Presented “First Tracks in the Greatest Snow on Earth: Wasatch Range Backcountry Skiing” on a panel
Presented “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
Kathryn Davis Fellowship for Peace
Department of Education Title VI Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship for Chinese from the University of Utah’s Asia Center
“Most Improved Student Award” in the Level 2.5 class
Jessica Guynn
2022 Tinker Pre-Dissertation Field Research Grant
Travis Hancock
Dissertation Travel Grant, University of Utah Department of History, Fall 2021
“The Many (De)colonial Lives of Kāpena George Gilley,” Pacific Historical Review
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.
Joseph Stuart
Invited Lecture: “Race and Religion: Building Bridges with Who? And to Where?,” Utah Valley University
Invited Lecture: “Critical Contexts for the Genesis Group’s Founding,”
Sema Hadithi: African American Heritage and Culture Foundation
Confrence Presentation: “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
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
Eliza McKinney
EDI Essay Winner
Undergraduate Student Awards & Recognitions
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 | Department 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
Department of History Tuition Waiver
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!
Annual Essay Contest Winner
“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.
Kayle Buckley
Lawrence T. and Janet T. Dee Student Travel Award
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.
Jessica Guynn
Annual Essay Contest Winner
“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 this essay, 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.
Jules Neilsen
EDI Essay Winner
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: Aija Moore, Adam Weinstein, Luke Seaver, Callie Avondet,
Elle Moulton, Emerald Fox, Hannah Salas, Jonathan Beeman, Robert Moncur
Students elected to the Phi Beta Kapa Society
Morgan Robinson, Nelson Sing, Lily Weeks