Staff profile
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Job title: Senior Lecturer
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Dept: History and American Studies
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Tel: 01227 782588
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Campus: Canterbury
Academic/Personal Background:
Sam studied History at the University of Wales and completed his doctorate in at Keele University’s David Bruce Centre for American Studies. He taught at Keele University and Manchester Metropolitan University before joining the department at Christ Church. Since coming here, he has also taught at Cazenovia College in New York on an academic faculty exchange.
Undergraduate Teaching Responsibilities
Level 4 (Year 1): Native American History: Pre-contact to Removal, 1491 – 1850s
Level 5 (Year 2): Native American History: Removal to Termination: 1850s – 1950s
From Civil War to Civil Rights: African-American History 1860s-1955
Level 6 (Year 3): Race, Resurgence and Resistance: Native American History from Red Power to Casinos
The Modern Black Freedom Movement: Civil Rights to Black Power and beyond
Sam is happy to supervise final year individual studies on virtually anything to do with Native American or African American history and culture.
Research Interests
Sam’s long-standing interest is exploring the experiences of African Americans and Native Americans who have been, as Martin Luther King put it, the “disinherited of this land,” those who have lived through histories of slavery, legalised racial segregation, physical removal and cultural as well as military attack. This has led to more specific interests in concepts of American national identity and patriotism, the black civil rights movement, the Red Power movement, and contemporary Native American activism.
Eg. Missions of Patriotism: Joseph H.Jackson and Martin Luther King, European Journal of American Studies, I / 2011
Sam’s other area of current research focuses on Julius Brenchley, a nineteenth century ‘gentleman explorer’ and traveller from Maidstone, Kent. He travelled extensively in the mid-late 1800s, including the American northwest, western Canada and Hawaii, where he encountered numerous tribes and collected dozens of objects that are now at Maidstone Museum. As only a small number of artefacts are on display at any time, the ongoing project is creating a virtual museum with all the pieces that he collected, as well as research on Brenchley himself.