Western Civilizations

Joshua Cole (PhD, University of California, Berkeley) is professor of history at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. His research focuses on gender and the history of population sciences, colonial violence, and the politics of memory in nineteenth- and twentieth-century France, Germany, and Algeria. His first book was The Power of Large Numbers: Population, Politics, and Gender in Nineteenth-Century France (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2000). Carol Symes is an Associate Professor of history and Director of Undergraduate Studies in the history department at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where she has won the top teaching award in the College of Liberal Arts and Science. Her main areas of study include medieval Europe, especially France and England; cultural history; history of information media and communication technologies; history of theatre. Her first book was A Common Stage: Theater and Public Life in Medieval Arras (2007). (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2007). Judith Coffin (Ph.D. Yale University) is Associate Professor at the University of Texas, Austin, where she won University of Texas President's Associates' Award for Teaching Excellence. Previously, she taught at Harvard University and the University of California, Riverside. Her research interests are the social and cultural history of gender, mass culture, slavery, race relations, and colonialism. She is the author of The Politics of Women's Work: The Paris Garment Trades, 1750-1915. Robert Stacey (Ph.D. Yale University) is Professor of History, Dean of the Humanities, and a member of the Jewish Studies faculty at the University of Washington, Seattle. A long-time teacher of Western civilizations and medieval European history, he has received Distinguished Teaching Awards from both the University of Washington and Yale University, where he taught from 1984 to 1988. He has authored and coauthored four books, including a textbook, The Making of England to 1399. He holds an M.A. from Oxford University and a Ph.D. from Yale.