Brenden Rensink

Instructor

Contact Information:

630 Oldfather Hall
Lincoln, NE 68588
Department of History
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
Phone: (402) 472-0601
E-mail:

Curriculum Vitae: Brenden Rensink - Curriculum Vitae - Oct. 2009

Joined the Department:

August 2004

Brenden Rensink is a Ph.D. student studying the North American West with emphases on comparative borderlands studies and the Native American experience. His current dissertation project focuses on transnational comparisons between the experience of indigenous immigrants and refugees along the Mexican-American and Canadian-American borderlands. The primary purpose of this research is to examine how the narratives of Sonora/Arizona Yaquis and Alberta/Montana Chippewa-Crees in the late 19th and early to mid twentieth centuries were affected by the strong influence of local borderlands economic, political and social interests upon the formation of federal policy.

Expertise:

• U.S. Twentieth Century
• North American West
• Borderlands
• Native American
• U.S. Nineteenth Century

Education:

Ph.d., History, University of Nebraska - Lincoln, Candidacy established: January 2008.
Dissertation, tentative title: "Defining Refugees, Creating Illegals and Bisecting Nations: North American Borderlands, Indigenous Refugee Immigrants and the Formation of Local and Federal Policy in Canada, the United States and Mexico, 1880-Present"

M.A., History, University of Nebraska - Lincoln, 2006
Thesis title: "Native American History, Comparative Genocide and the Holocaust: Historiography, Debate and Critical Analysis."

B.A., History, Brigham Young University, 2003

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Courses Taught:

HIST	202	004	Spring 2009	AMERICA SINCE 1877
HIST	202	006	Fall 2008	AMERICA SINCE 1877

Publications:

Journal Articles:

“The Immigrant Refugee Experience of Yaquis and Chippewa-Crees in Arizona and Montana: How Local Borderland Interests Dictated Federal Policy” Journal of the West (Summer, 2010).

“‘If a Passage Could be Found’: The Power of Myth (and Money) in North American Exploration.” We Proceeded On (Spring 2010).

“The Sand Creek Phenomenon: The Complexity and Difficulty of Undertaking a Comparative Study of Genocide vis-à-vis the Northern American West.” Genocide Studies and Prevention: an International Journal 4:1 (Spring 2009): 9-27.

“The Omaha Daily Bee.” JNews, University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Journalism and Mass Communications
Alumni Magazine (Summer, 2008): 20-21.

“The Myth of an Easy Passage to the Far East.” The Thetean 32 (2004): 111-130.

Book Chapters and Contributions:

“Cree Contraband or Contraband Crees: How Montanan First Experiences with Transnational Natives Defined a Generation of Borderlands Native-White Interaction, 1880-1885.” In Transnational Vice and Contraband in North America, Andrae Marak and Elaine Carey, eds. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2011.

“Native America and the Question of Genocide: Historical Facts and Historiographic Debates.” In Indigenous Peoples and Genocide, Vol. 8 in the Genocide: a Critical Bibliographic Series, Samuel Totten and Robert Hitchcock, eds. Edison, New Jersey, Transaction Publishers, 2010.

“Addendum: Chippewa Cree Research Archives at Rocky Boy School.” In Ed Stamper, Helen Windy Boy and Ken Morsette Jr., eds, The History of the Chippewa Cree of Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation, 223-234. Box Elder, Montana: Stone Child College Press, 2008.

“Nebraska and Kansas Territories in American Legal Culture: Territorial Statutory Context.” In The Nebraska-Kansas Act of 1854, John Wunder and Joann Ross, eds, 47-66. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 2008.


Conference Presentations:

“Transborder Indigenous Migration and Refugee Experiences.”
Western History Association 49th Annual Conference, October 2009. Roundtable Panel title: “Both Borders: A Roundtable on Researching and Writing on the West’s Mexican and Canadian Borderlands,” chaired by Dr. Ben Johnson.

“‘I Never Was Tired of a Tribe as I am of This One’: Montanan Efforts to Deport Foreign Indians, 1880-1916.”
Northern Great Plains History Conference, October 14-17, 2009

“Creating Illegals out of Natives: U.S., Mexican and Canadian Borderlands and the Politics of Indigenous Migration.”
The James A. Rawley Conference in the Humanities, 28 March 2009

“Mexican Borderlands, Indigenous Ethnogenesis and Community Identity, 1500-Present.”
The James A. Rawley Conference in the Humanities, 12 April 2008

“Yaqui and Rocky Boy Cree Refugees in Arizona and Montana: Borderland Peripheries and the Formation of Federal Borderlands Indian Policy”
The Missouri Valley History Conference, 6 March 2008

“Justifying Autonomy through Regional Distinction: Identity Construction and Rhetorical Fallacy in Separatist Transnistria and the Republic of Moldova.”
The James A. Rawley Conference in the Humanities, 7 April 2007



Professional Service:

President, UNL History Graduate Student Association, 2008-2009

Panel Chair, The James A. Rawley Conference in the Humanities, April 2008

Panel Commenter, The James A. Rawley Conference in the Humanities, April 2008

Award Committee Chair, The James A. Rawley Conference in the Humanities, April 2007

Senator, Graduate Student Association, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, September 2006 – May 2008


Grants and Fellowships:

Addison Sheldon Fellowship, UNL Department of History, 2009-2010.

Grant-in-Aid Research Fellowship, Center for Great Plains Studies, Fall 2008.

Barnes Fund Research Travel Grant, UNL Department of History, September 2008.

Graduate Studies Research Fellowship, UNL College of Graduate Studies, August 2008.

Graduate Nonresident Fellowship, UNL College of Graduate Studies, August 2004-2010.


Awards and Honors:

Best Graduate Student Paper Prize, Northern Great Plains History Conference, 2009.

Walter Rundell Graduate Student Award, Western History Association, 2009.

University Libraries Influence Award, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, 2009.

Certificate of Recognition for Contributions to Students, UNL Teaching Council and Parents Association, Fall 2008.