Annual Graduate Student Research Conference

Each fall, all MA candidates enrolled in the seminar "Introduction to Historical Research" present papers based on their original research of an individually selected historical topic. Participants are encouraged to invite faculty, fellow students, friends, and family to hear their presentations.  Some of the presenters go on to win awards for their scholarship.  Below are the names of presenters and project titles in the order they were delivered at each AAnnual Graduate Research Conference.

2023 Conference Presenters and Presentations

DECEMBER 5, 2023

Dwayne Fitzgerald
          "Tipped Scales: How the Rhodesian Counter Insurgency led to Political Defeat, 1972-79"
Matthew Perkins
          "AIDS, Art, and Activism (1981-1996): The Contextual Understanding of Gran Fury Through Visual
           Media" - Winner of the 2024 Sherrod Library Graduate Student Scholarship for Excellence in
           Research!  

Alyssa Murphy
          "Alessandra Strozzi and the Multidimensionality of Women in the Italian Renaissance"
Hannah Robinson
          "The Creation of the Women's LIberation Movement, 1960-1975"
Audey Dillon
          "The Empowerment of Women Through Food and Gender Roles in Appalachia (1945-1985"
Andrew Tyler Counts
          "A Necessity for Pirates: English Use of Buccaneers and Privateers for Colonial Competition"
Max Marlow
          Law Enforcement and Political Vilence in Weimar Germany (1928-1933)
Reagan Battershell
          "The Legacy of Hollywood Propaganda in WWII: 1942-1951"
Tyler BIshop
          "An Analysis of the Adverse Effects of ARtillery and Chemical Warfare on Soldiers' Lives in the Trenches
           of World War I"
Chuka Agbo
          "Indirect Rule in the Igbo World: The Agbaja Experience, 1929-1936"
Emily Hardy
          "The Tudor Sisters and the Direct INfluence of Interpersonal Relationships on Monarch-Chosen Policies
           (1516-1603)"
Andy Horton Lawson III
          "Joseph McCarthy vs The Voice of America (1953)"

2022 Conference Presenters and Presentations

NOVEMBER 29, 2022

Kyle Owen

          "The Alabama Claims: Challenging British Hegemony and America's Rise,
          1861-1903" 
Baylor Anderson
          "The Illusion of Unity in the Construction of the National Socialist
          Volksgemeinschaft, 1930-1939" 
Slade Nakoff
          "Tidewater Roots of Frontier Culture: the Balance of Aristocracy and Liberty,
         1720-1820" 
Taryn Shelnutt-Beam
          "Power and the Early Modern Widow: A Cultural Analysis of English Women,
         1480-1520" 
Samuel Parker
          "Remembering Heroes: Diplomacy and Popular Memory of the American
         Revolution, 1778-1783" 
Bukunmi Ofili
          "Reconsidering the Stamp Act as a Precursor to Colonial Unification, 1765-1776" 
Braden Lay
          "Bristol Tennessee and Virginia During Reconstruction, 1865-1877" 
Julia Underkoffler
          "Mount Auburn Cemetery: Rural Cemeteries, Preservation, and Public Parks,
         1825-Present" 
Taylor Hill
          "Confederate Women in the Civil War, 1861-1865" 
Remi Berg
          "The Union's Scandinavian Regiment, 1861-1865" - Winner of the 2023 Sherrod Library
            Graduate Student Scholarship for Excellence in Research! 

2021 Conference Presenters and Presentations 

November 30, 2021 

Clayton Huff
          “Japanese American Internment Camps (1942-1988)”
Lawson Garrett Hammock
          “Asserting Identity and Place in the East L.A. Chicana/o Punk Rock Scene
          (1975-1987)”
Adewale Oluwadare Adebayo
          “Racial Discrimination of Black Americans and the Quest for Liberation from
            1945 to 1970”
Lexi Doutrich
          “Nineteenth Century Smallpox Vaccination: Anti-vaccination Leagues and Their
          Role in Swaying Public Interest (1853-1907)”
Kaleb Jenkins
          “The Formation of Dutch-American Agriculture in New Netherland and English
          New York, (1624-1685)”
Richard Lloyd
           “Along the Clinchfield: Small Town Appalachian Industrialization (1917–1957)”
Nurudeen Oladipupo Ogundare
           “Medical Ethics and Vaccination in Western Colonial Nigeria, (1910-1945)”
Olusegun Olatunji
           “Politics of Gendered Identities and Power Relations in the Traditional Festivals
            among the Yoruba  People, 1897-1960” - Winner of the 2022 Sherrod Library
            Graduate Student Scholarship for Excellence in Research! 
Beverly Pennington
          “J. Marion Sims’ Life, Medical Undertakings, and Experimentation on Slaves 
            (1813-1884)”
Hannah G. Youngers
          “Women in Resistance to the Nazis (1933 - 1945)”

 2020 Conference Presenters and Presentations

December 1, 2020 

Alyssa Ferguson
          “The Religious Conversion and Rule of Nefertiti in Ancient Egypt
         (1353-1336 B.C.)”
Lora Estep-Davis
           “Politics & Relationships: Edward IV’s Use of Marriage to Control Ambition
             and Power in his Court (1464-1470)”
Margaret Webb (Archival Studies Graduate Certificate Program)
          "From Sewing Machine to Factory: Freeport's Dressmakers 1900-1922"
Shawn Cecconi
          “The Hope for Peace and the Case for War in the Postwar Soviet Union
          (1945-1956)”
Alyssa Musick
          "The Life of Virginia's Last Royal Governor: Revolutionary Era through the eyes
           of John Murray/Lord Dunmore, 1732-1809."
Zachary Miller
          “False Privilege: Poor Whites in Antebellum Tennessee (1830-1860)”


Justin Cosby
           “The Decision to Invade Tripoli: Thomas Jefferson’s Influence (1797-1805)”
Ethan Spann
           “Church and the Highlands: How the Religious Landscape of the Unaka
            Mountain Range Shaped the Community”
Philip DeVries
          “The title is Living in Harmony: Muslims, Jews, and Andalusi Music in Interwar
            Francophonie (1919 - 1939)”
Irene Poulton
          “To the British, India (1830-1870)”
Michael Pagel
          “Twelfth-Century Spanish Reconquest and Crusade Literature 1100 – 1150”