Jeannette Eileen Jones

Happold Professor of History and Ethnic Studies, Director of the 19th Century Studies Program Profile Image
Happold Professor of History and Ethnic Studies, Director of the 19th Century Studies Program History jjones11@unl.edu 402-472-2414 633 Oldfather Hall
JOINED THE DEPARTMENT

2004

I am a historian of the United States, with particular emphasis in American cultural and intellectual history and African American Studies, with strong interests in race and representation, Atlantic studies, and science studies. My research reflects my desire to contribute to the larger critical conversations taking place in these fields, specifically around the role of race in shaping American cultural and intellectual discourse and production. More precisely, my research examines the ways in which “race” as a popular and scientific category operated as a potent signifier of difference—cultural, biological, social, and political—in late nineteenth and early twentieth century America. However, recognizing the rising global significance of race as an organizing principle, as well as the transnational migration of ideas about race during this period (roughly the Gilded Age to the end of Word War II), my research extends across the Atlantic. It seeks to uncover the discursive relationship between America, other Western, and “subaltern” perspectives on imperialism, citizenship, and social belonging, as mediated primarily through the lens of race, but also through those of gender (ideas about femininity and masculinity), and sexuality.

BOOKS
DIGITAL PROJECTS

“To Enter Africa from America”: The United States, Africa, and the New Imperialism, 1847-1919 with Nadia Nurhussein, Nemata Blyden, and John Cullen Gruesser

ARTICLES AND BOOK CHAPTERS
GRANTS AND FELLOWSHIPS
  • NEH (National Endowment for the Humanities) Collaborative Research Grant, January 2019-December 2021
  • REAF (Regensburg European American Forum) Fellow, University of Regensburg, Germany, sponsored by Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Bildung und Kultus, Wissenschaft, und Kunst, Summer 2017
  • Center for Digital Research in the Humanities Start-up Grant, 2013-2014.
  • Deutsche Bank Junior Scholar-In-Residence Fellowship, University of Heidelberg (Germany), Center for American Studies, 2007-2008.
TEACHING

African American Women’s History
History of Hip-Hop
United States History since 1877
African American History to 1877
Introduction to African American Studies
Introduction to Ethnic Studies
Graduate Seminar: Problems in Race, Ethnicity, and Identity in History
Graduate Seminar: Research and Writing in History
Graduate Seminar: The Professional Study of History

SELECTED HONORS AND AWARDS
  • College Engagement Award, College of Arts & Sciences, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2017
  • College Distinguished Teaching Award, College of Arts & Sciences, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2016
  • Academic Star, College of Arts & Sciences, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Fall 2009
  • Faculty of the Year Award, The Afrikan People’s Union, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2009
EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND

Ph.D., SUNY-Buffalo, 2003
M.A., SUNY-Buffalo, 1997
B.A., Hofstra, 1993

RESEARCH INTERESTS AND EXPERTISE

US History;
American Intellectual and Cultural History;
African-American History and Studies;
Gilded Age and Progressive Era History;
Digital Humanities and Digital History;
History of Science and Science Studies;
Transnational History;
Pre-Colonial West Africa;
Black European Studies;
Black West