The PhD Program in History Student Bios
The PhD Program in History has approximately 100 students currently enrolled, including:
Amanda Westbrook Brennan
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: Gender
Degrees Conferred: BS in Business Administration, Georgetown University (2006), MA in Humanities and Social Thought, New York University (2014)
Research Interests: 20th century US History, mutual construction of race and gender, cultural ideals, motherhood.
Dissertation Title: The History of ‘Having It All’: Black and White Women and Work-Life Balance from 1890-today
Contact info: abrennan@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Soheil Asefi
Major Field: Middle East History
Minor Field: Queer History and Sexuality/Modern Europe
Degrees Conferred: M.A. Political Science, The New School for Social Research (NSSR,) 2017. B.A. Film Studies, Tehran Art Soore University (SU,) 2008.
Research Interests: Transgenerational History of Love and Politics, Modern German History and Sexuality, Iranian Leftist Movements, Iranian Red Diaper Babies (Born and Raised in Communist Family,) Political Socialization of Youth, The Politics of Memory, Belonging, and Trauma, Revolutionary Politics, Marxism, Historical Materialism, The Cold War, Imperialism, The Commodification of Public Spheres, Public History, Political Agency in Exile, Queer Diaspora, Refugees and Migration, Radical Queer History, Diaspora Politics.
Contact Info: sasefi@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Miranda Brethour
Major Field: Modern Europe
Minor Field: Public History
Degrees Conferred: B.A. History (University of Ottawa, 2017); M.A History (University of Ottawa, 2019)
Research Interests: History of the Holocaust in Poland, modern Eastern Europe, gender and sexuality
Recent Publications: Miranda Brethour, “Jewish-Gentile Relations in Hiding during the Holocaust in Sokołów County, Poland.” The Journal of Holocaust Research 33, no. 4 (2019): 277-301.
Contact info: mbrethour@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Kikuko Tanaka
Major Field: Modern European History
Minor Field: Intellectual History
Degree Conferred: M.A in History (CUNY Graduate Center, NY), B.S in Environmental Cultural History (Chiba University, Japan)
Research Interests: Global cross-pollination of philosophy, religion, and ideology; Enlightenment and Anti-Enlightenment philosophical traditions; Orientalism; politics of history-writing; philosophy of history and historiographic methods
Dissertation Topic: My dissertation probes into the political implications of Japanese philosopher Kuki Shūzō’s aesthetic and formal philosophy. Contrary to the preceding historiography that condemned Kuki as a fascist, my dissertation argues that Kuki’s philosophy contained potentiality for anti-totalitarianism.
Contact info: ktanaka@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Madeline DeDe-Panken
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: Women and Gender
Degrees Conferred: B.A., History, Clark University (2012); M.A., History, Clark University (2013); M.Phil. in History, The Graduate Center, CUNY (2019)
Research Interests: History of science, food history, women’s history. I am broadly interested in questions of gender and authority revolving around scientific and domestic knowledge. My dissertation explores women’s involvement in scientific and sustenance mushroom foraging as it relates to a popular food fad at the turn of the 20th century.
Contact info: mdedepanken@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Deena Ecker
Major Field: U.S. History
Minor Field: Women and Sexuality
Degrees Conferred: B.A., History, Brandeis University
Research Interests: Prostitution, history of sexuality, history of gender, women’s history, urban history, New York City history
.Contact info: decker@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Carli Snyder
Major Field: U.S. History
Minor Field: Modern Europe
Degrees Conferred: BA in History and Women’s and Gender Studies, Pacific Lutheran University (2017), MA in History, CUNY Graduate Center (2019
Research Interests: Holocaust history and memory, museum studies, memory studies, history of feminism, oral history, histories of race, gender, and sexuality, late 20th century
Contact info: csnyder1@gradcenter.cuny.edu
John T. Massey
Major Field: Early Modern History
Minor Field: Medieval
Degrees Conferred: M.Phil. History, Graduate Center; B.A. History, Mathematics Saint Peter’s University
Research Interests: I am currently writing a dissertation on the lives of seminarians entering the English College, Rome from 1598-1610 through their responses to the institution’s entrance questionnaire. I have secondary interests in early modern medicine and innovations to mathematics in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Contact info: jmassey@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Madeline Lafuse
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: Gender and Sexuality Studies
Degrees Conferred: BA Tulane University in History, Asian Studies, Linguistics, Gender & Sexuality Studies; MA CUNY Graduate Center in History
Research Interests: I study enslaved people poisoning their masters in nineteenth-century New Orleans from a cultural perspective. I am interested in how poison reveals contradictions between the household, national expansion, and slavery. I am also interested in the history of emotions and affect studies.
Contact info: mlafuse@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Jarrett Moran
Major field: Modern European History
Minor field: Intellectual History
Degrees conferred: MA, Modern European Studies (Columbia University); BA, Ethics, Politics, and Economics (Yale University)
Research interests: History of criticism and the idea of culture in the nineteenth and twentieth century; history of political thought (particularly liberalism); British History
Dissertation Title: “Culture and Its Discontents: Arnoldian Culture in Britain from the 1860s to the 1960s”
Contact info: jmoran@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Cathy Cabrera-Figueroa
Major Field: Latin American History
Minor Field: US and Latino History
Degrees Conferred: MA Lehman College
Research Interests: Puerto Rico, Puerto Ricans in the United States, Migration, Labor, Gender and Sexuality
Contact info: ccabrerafi@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Barbara Bailin
Major Field: Modern European History (Germany)
Minor Field: Jewish Studies
Degrees Conferred: Combined B.A./M.A. (History) The City College of New York (2011), M. Phil in History (The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2016)
Research Interests: My research focuses on the interaction among various agencies of the Third Reich and their role in the development of the Holocaust; I am also interested in 20th century comparative anti-Semitism
Dissertation working title: “Rivals and Partners”: The Competition for Control of Judenpolitik in Reichskommissariat Ostland (1941-1944).
Contact info: bbailin@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Stephen Lazar
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: Comparative Radical Politics
Degrees Conferred: MA in History; 2018; The Graduate Center, City University of New York. MA in African-American Studies; 2006; Columbia University. BA in Political Philosophy & Religious Studies; 2004; Brown University.
Research Interests: Post World War II Black Freedom Struggles, Education
Contact info: slazar@gradcenter.cuny.edu
On Leave Spring 2021
Julián González de León Heiblum
Major Field: Early Modern Europe
Minor Field: History and Anthropology
Degrees Conferred: MA in History, Concentration in Antiquity and Middle Ages (UNAM-FFL, 2015). BA in History (UNAM-FFL, 2011)
Research Interests: Medieval and Early Modern British Empire; Arthurian Myth; Celtic Cultures; Conceptual History; Theory of Empire; Theory of Myth.
Recent Publications: “The Arthurian Legend: A Vehicle for Symbolic Appropriation of the Insular Space”, UCLA Historical Journal 1, 26 (2015): 1-15.
Contact Info: jgdeleon@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Benjamin Diehl
Major Field: Modern European History
Minor Field: TBD
Degrees Conferred: BA in International Relations, SUNY College at Geneseo, 2018; MA in European History, Politics, and Society, Columbia University, 2020.
Research Interests: Modern Germany, European political history, charisma and politics, electoral/popular politics, political culture, urban history, history of the state, social democracy
Contact info: bdiehl@gradcenter.cuny.edu ; benjamin.john.diehl@gmail.com
Daniela Moraes Traldi
Major Field: Latin America/ Gender and Women’s History
Degrees Conferred: MSc History of International Relations (London School of Economics and Political Science); International Diploma in Humanitarian Assistance (Fordham University); Certificate in Global Affairs (New York University); Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism (FIAM Brazil).
Research Interests: women’s movements in Latin America; transnational/ global feminism; gender and sexuality; feminist/ gender theory; social and political thought.
Contact info: dtraldi@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Evan Augustine Turiano
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: Global Enlightenment Thought
Degrees Conferred: M.Phil. in History, The Graduate Center, CUNY (2020); M.A. in History, The Graduate Center, CUNY (2018); B.A. in American Studies, Trinity College, CT (2016)
Research Interests: Early American History; Slave Flight and the Underground Railroad; Slavery and Antislavery; Legal and Political History
Dissertation Title: “Running toward Abolition: Fugitive Slaves, Legal Rights, and the Coming of the Civil War”
Contact info: eturiano@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Mohamad J. Hodeib
Major Field: Middle East History
Minor Field: Intellectual History
Degrees Conferred: M.A. Middle East Studies, Graduate Center (CUNY); B.A., Political Science/International Affairs, Lebanese American University
Research Interests: Power, intellectuals, ideology, political culture, cultural history, revolutionary politics, counter-culture, poetry, music, song, civil war, the Arab Levant, Lebanon, Palestine
Contact Info: mhodeib@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Rebecca Irvine
Major Field: Modern Middle East
Minor Field: Women’s and Gender History
Degrees Conferred: BA History, University of Sheffield; MA Middle Eastern Studies, Lund University
Research Interests: history of Iraq, labor history, colonialism, gender, modernity and the state
Contact info: rirvine@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Helena Yoo Roth
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: Undecided
Degrees Conferred: B.A., American Studies, Columbia University (2016)
Research Interests: early US history, transatlantic history, cultural history
Contact info: hyoo@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Idan Liav
Major Field: Modern Europe and Israel-Palestine
Minor Field: History of memory
Degrees Conferred: M.A. in History, Graduate Center, CUNY; M.A in Conflict Research, Management and Resolution, Hebrew University of Jerusalem; B.A. in International Relations and English Literature, Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Research Interests: Israeli-Palestinian conflict, history of memory, Holocaust memory, conceptual history.
Contact info: iliav@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Rafael Davis Portela
Major Field: Latin American History
Minor Field: History of Capitalism
Degrees Conferred: M.Phil in History, The Graduate Center; M.A. in Social History, Universidade Federal da Bahia; B.A. in History, Universidade Federal da Bahia.
Research Interests: History of Capitalism; Transnational History; History of Transportation; Riots and Rebellions in Latin America.
Recent publications: “O Caso da Canoa Incendiada: Perfis e Relações de Pescadores em Salvador (1853-1880)”, Revista Mundos do Trabalho Vol 7 Num 14 (2015).
Contact info: rdavisportela@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Jessica Georges
Major Field: US
Minor Field: African Diaspora
Degrees Conferred: M.A., The City College of New York, CUNY
Research Interests: I am broadly interested in discourses around nationalism and definitions of freedom in the early republic. My research centers on the African American colonization movement in the years leading to and following northern emancipation. I also study the history of New York and am particularly interested in the study race and gender in the Atlantic world.
Contact info: jgeorges1@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Blake Mcgready
Major Field: U.S. History
Minor Field: undecided
Degrees Conferred: B.A. in History, SUNY New Paltz (2013); M.A. in History, Villanova University (2017)
Research Interests: early U.S. history, environmental history
Contact info: bmcgready@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Maayan Brodsky
Major Field: US History
Degrees Conferred: MA (American History – Tel Aviv University), BA (Comparative Literature and American Studies – Tel Aviv University).
Research Interests: Government secrecy
Contact info: mbrodsky@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Oscar Aponte
Major field: Latin American and Caribbean history
Minor field: U.S./Latinx history
Degrees conferred: B.A. in Sociology, National University of Colombia; M.A. in History, University of Los Andes (Colombia); M.A. in History, The Graduate Center-CUNY.
Research interests: My research revolves around agrarian history, rural colonization, indigenous peoples and the state, infrastructure projects, and extractive economies in the Amazon rainforest. I’m also interested in environmental history, history of the press, labor history, Latinx studies, and critical theory.
Publications: Aponte, O. (2020). Socioeconomic Conditions of Foreign-Born and Domestic-Born Latinos in New York City, 1990-2018. Latino Data Project, Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies, The Graduate Center, CUNY [forthcoming].
Emily Brooks
Major Field: U.S. History
Minor Field: Urban History
Degrees Conferred: M.Phil (CUNY Graduate Center, 2016), BA (University of Michigan, 2009).
Research Interests: history of policing, gender history, construction of social deviance, urban history
Recent Publications: “Marijuana in La Guardia’s New York City: The Mayor’s Committee and Federal Policy, 1938-1945,” Journal of Policy History. (Autumn 2016)
Contact Info: ebrooks@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Marybeth Tamborra
Major Field: Modern European History
Minor Field: Labor and Capitalism
Degrees Conferred: ‘AB Anthropology with honors, University of Chicago 2010
Research Interests: I am interested in the tensions between the possibilities of freedoms and forms of domination. My most recent research examined Fascist Italian housing projects in colonial Libya and settlements on the outskirts of Rome. My broad research interests include labor, capitalism, domestic service work, class, social theory, Marx, Italian Fascism, and housing.
Contact info: mtamborra@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Erin Cully
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: History of Capitalism
Degrees Conferred: BA (2012) and MA (2013) in history, McGill University
Research Interests: History of banking and finance, political economy, global history, 20th century US history.
Contact info: ecully@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Tamara Maatouk
Major Field: Middle East History
Minor Field: Cultural History
Degrees Conferred: BA in Cinema and Television (USEK, 2010); MA in History (AUB, 2017).
Research Interests: Twentieth-Century Egypt; Film as History; Cultural History; History of Emotions.
Recent Publications: Maatouk, Tamara. “Understanding the Public Sector in Egyptian Cinema: A State Venture.” Cairo Papers in Social Science 35/3. Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press, 2019.
Contact info: tmaatouk@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Adam Kocurek
Major Field: American History
Minor Field: Gender History/Feminist Studies
Research Interests: Labor history, LGBT history, History of Sexuality, History of Gender.
Contact info: akocurek@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Sophie Tunney
Major Field: Early Modern Europe
Minor Field: Modern Europe, Focus: France in the 17th and 18th centuries.
Degrees Conferred: M.Phil. in History, The Graduate Center, CUNY (2019); B.A. in History and English Literature, NYU (2015)
Research Interest: I focus on the intersections between science, colonization, and the state in Old Regime France. My dissertation traces the French botanical network (a global correspondence network that circulated thousands of plants and seeds) during the seventeenth and the eighteenth centuries. It focuses on the day-to-day lives of different botanists (and their plants) across France, its colonies and the wider world. Through my work on the botanical network, I also research the material history of plants and their movement across the globe.
Contact Info: stunney@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Richard A. Naclerio
Major Field: American History
Minor Field: Middle Eastern History
Degrees Conferred: BA, MA, MPhil
Research Interests: US Financial and Economic History
Contact info: rnaclerio@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Miriam Liebman
Major Field: United States History
Minor Field: Women’s and Gender History
Degrees Conferred: B.A. Queens College, CUNY (2014); M.Phil. The Graduate Center, CUNY (2017)
Research Interests: early US history, women’s history, transatlantic history, Franco-American connections
Contact Info: mliebman@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Arinn Amer
Major Field: American History
Minor Field: Theory and History of Violence
Degrees Conferred: BA, American Studies, Columbia University (2011); MA, MPhil American History, CUNY Graduate Center (2016, 2018)
Research interests: Early American material and print culture, tarring and feathering
Contact info: aamer2@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Israel Ben-Porat
Major Field: American History
Minor Field: Early Modern Europe
Degrees Conferred: BA in History, Yeshiva University (2018); MA in History, CUNY Graduate Center (2020)
Research Interests: Transatlantic Puritanism; Hebraism and Jewish-Christian relations; biblical reception
Recent Publications: “American Artaxerxes: Esther in Early Modern Political Hebraism,” in Esther in America: The Scroll’s Interpretation in and Impact on the United States, ed. Stuart W. Halpern (Maggid Books/Yeshiva University Press), 13-28; “Hebrew Bible or Old Testament? Evaluating the American Biblical Tradition,” The Lehrhaus (9/11/19)
Katie Uva
Major Field: American History
Minor Field: Urban History
Degrees Conferred: M.Phil (2014), M.A. (2013), B.A. in American Studies and Classics from Boston University (2010)
Dissertation Title: Fair City: Midcentury Urbanism and New York World’s FairsResearch Interests: cultural history, New York City, housing, consumerism, popular culture, public history
Recent publications: “1964 and the State of the City” in World’s Fairs in the Era of the Cold War (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019); additionally, people interactives for Robert Moses, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., and Samuel Lefrak currently on view in New York at its Core at the Museum of the City of New York.
Contact info: Katie.uva@gmail.com
Andrew Kotick
Major Field: Modern European History
Minor Field: History of Popular Culture
Degrees Conferred: M.Phil, History (CUNY Graduate Center, 2017); M.A., French Studies (NYU, 2014); B.A., History (New College of Florida, 2013)
Research Interests: History of humor and laughter; history of nationalism and mass politics; history of the press; cartooning, animation, and graphic media; political culture and ideology; history and memory
Email: akotick@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Marc Kagan
Major Field: American History – Labor History
Minor Field: World History
Dissertation Title: The Fall and Rise and Fall of TWU Local 100
Research Interests: Contemporary Class Struggle in the United States
Recent publications: More Austerity Coming? Lessons from New York City’s 1970s Fiscal Crisis, New Labor Forum, Volume 29 Issue 3 (Fall 2020); “The Great American Crack-up: Maybe It’s Time To Part Ways, New York Daily News, Nov. 6, 2020
Contact info: marckagan@aol.com
Yanara Schmacks
Major Field: Modern Europe
Minor Field: Intellectual History
Degrees Conferred: B.A. Liberal Arts & Sciences (University College Maastricht, 2015), M.A. Interdisciplinary Research on Antisemitism (Technical University of Berlin, 2018)
Research Interests: Reproductive politics, concepts of motherhood,
post-Nazi East and West Germany, psychoanalysis, nationalism
Dissertation working title: Reproductive Nation: The Politics of
Motherhood in Germany, 1970s-2000s
Recent publications: “‘Only Mothers Can Be True Revolutionaries’: The Politicization of Motherhood in 1980s West German Psychoanalysis”, in Psychoanalysis and History, 23(1) (forthcoming, April 2021).
“‘Motherhood is Beautiful’: Maternalism in the West German New Women’s Movement between Eroticization and Ecological Protest”, in Central European History, 53(4) (2020), 811-834.
Contact info: yschmacks@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Anastasia Kirtiklis
Major Field: US History
Minor Field: Medicine & Health
Degrees Conferred: BA, American Studies, Columbia University; MA, Health Education, Columbia University
Research interests: constructions of mental and physical wellness, identity, consumerism, sexuality, emotions, trauma, spirituality, and religion in 19th & 20th century US and transnational history; intellectual history
Contact info: akirtiklis@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Erik Wallenberg
Major Field: U.S. History
Minor Field: Environmental History
Degrees Conferred: BS, Environmental Studies, University of Vermont, 2003. MA, History, University of Vermont, 2013
Research Interests: I am researching a dissertation on radical theater groups connected to a variety of social movements organizing environmental, labor, civil rights, and anti-war work in the twentieth century United States. Environmental concerns are what hold each of them together. I am actively working in the fields of environmental history, Black freedom studies, labor history, theater history, and American Studies.
Contact info: ewallenberg@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Davide Colasanto
Major Field: Modern European History
Minor Field: Cultural History of War
Degrees Conferred: M. Phil in History (The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2015); M.S. in Cultural Management (ESCP Europe Paris and University of Venice, 2012); M.A. in European Literary Cultures (University of Bologna and University of Strasbourg, 2011); B.A. in Literature (University of Bologna, 2009);
Research Interests: Sexuality and Violence from Fascism to Postwar;
Contact info: dcolasanto@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Kate Kelley
Major Field: Modern Europe
Minor Field: Intellectual History
Degrees Conferred: B.A. in History and German, Hunter College; M.A. in History, CUNY Graduate Center
Research Interests: Cold War, Soviet bloc, East Germany, communism, socialism, art & culture, performance, politics, the state, nationality, memory, race, gender & sexuality
Dissertation Working Title: “How Cinderella became a Communist: The Politics of Classical Ballet in East Germany”
Contact info: kkelley@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Miranda Brethour
Major Field: Modern European History
Minor Field: Gender and Sexuality
Degrees Conferred: Honours Bachelor of Arts in History (University of Ottawa), Master of Arts in History (University of Ottawa)
Research Interests: The Holocaust in rural Poland; Jewish-Gentile relations
Dissertation Topic: Sexual violence in hiding during the Holocaust in Poland
Recent publications:
Miranda Brethour, “Jewish-Gentile Relations in Hiding during the Holocaust in Sokołów County, Poland.” The Journal of Holocaust Research 33 no. 4 (2019): 277-301.
Miranda Brethour, “Upamiętnianie Zagłady w kraju multikulturalizmu. Kanada wobec spuścizny Zagłady od lat siedemdziesiątych do chwili obecnej.” [“Remembering the Holocaust in the Land of Multiculturalism: Canada and the Legacy of the Holocaust from the 1970s to the Present”]. Zagłada Żydów 14 (2018): 769-789.
Contact info: mbrethour@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Esther Adaire
Major Field: Modern European History
Minor Field: Intellectual History
Degrees Conferred: BA (Hons) Theater & Performance (Goldsmiths University of London, 2011); MA History (Goldsmiths University of London, 2015)
Research Interests: The far-right in unified Germany and beyond; the role of the military in unified Germany; memory politics in East and West Germany; post-1989 European politics; disinformation campaigns and other threats to democracy; conceptual history.
Dissertation Working Title: “German Memory Politics and the Far-Right since 1989”
Website: www.estheradaire.com
Recent Publications: “‘This Other Germany, the Dark One.’ Post-Wall Memory Politics Surrounding the Neo-Nazi Riots in Rostock and Hoyerswerda’ in German Politics and Society, Vol. 37, No. 4 (Winter 2019), pp. 43-57
“Destroying German History: The Work of Heiner Müller as a Challenge to Public Memory,” in Communications of the International Brecht Society (April 2020)
Contact Info: eadaire@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Micki Kaufman
Major Field: US History (20th C)
Minor Field: World / International History
Degrees Conferred: B.A., U.S. History with Highest Honors, Columbia University. A.A., Simon’s Rock of Bard College
Research Interests: My research focuses on computational research in U.S. diplomatic and international history, most recently an analysis of the tenure of Henry Kissinger as National Security Advisor and Secretary of State using a large collection of the DNSA’s declassified U.S. government archives dated 1968-1977. I am co-author of an article on Cold War wargaming and technology forecasting in the December 2012 American Historical Review titled “General, I Have Fought Just as Many Nuclear Wars As You Have,” and I received a 2012-2013 Provost’s Digital Innovation Grant to expand my research to include additional databases including the ‘Foreign Policy Files’ of the US State Department (NARA Secret Record Group 59). I have taught undergraduate history at Hunter College and have served as the Technology Coordinator for the Hertog Global Strategy Initiative’s 2011 “Summer Fever” and 2010 “Nuclear Summer” research programs.
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