On Monday, May 1 students in History 680/690: Senior Thesis Colloquium presented on their original undergraduate research projects in an afternoon event at the Pyle Center. Presentations were divided into four panels: the State and the Environment, Inequality and Oppression in the United States, Trauma and Memory, and the Making of the Modern World. Professor Judd Kinzley led the colloquium this semester and mentored 16 History majors through their first or second semester of thesis research, in coordination with their faculty advisors. A reception followed the presentations, providing an opportunity for all attendees to celebrate this momentous achievement amidst the busy end of a semester. Thank you to all who attended, and congratulations to our thesis students on reaching this incredible milestone in their academic careers!
Photo credits: Andy Manis
PANEL 1: THE STATE AND THE ENVIRONMENT
- Maddy McGlone: “Something Wonderful and Beautiful: Conflict and Collaboration in the Founding of the University of Wisconsin Arboretum”
- Andrea Lyne Corro: “Colonial Jim Crow: The Perpetuation of the Gold and Silver Payroll System in the Panama Canal Zone”
- Cole Roecker: “Restoration or Cattail-ization? The Drainage of Horicon Marsh and the Shortcomings of ‘Restoring’ Land”
- Kylie Hollenstein: “Druid Tycoons, A Look at the Development of Hilton Head Island”
PANEL 2: INEQUALITY AND OPPRESSION IN THE UNITED STATES
- Josh Kobussen: “Contradictions of the American Dream: Victor Berger and Censorship During WWI”
- Isaac Owen: “Forging Alliances in Post-Civil War Kentucky: How Clubs and Conversations Led a Kentucky Business Class Towards a Commercial Future in the Gilded Era”
- Ruoshui Liu: “Following the Money: Currencies and the Financial Infrastructures of the Yunnanese Tin Trade, 1905 – 1949”
- Robert Hall: “Information Wants to Be Free: How Public Universities Contributed to Mass Incarceration”
PANEL 3: TRAUMA AND MEMORY
- KJ LeFave: “How the French Fur Trade and Resulting Religious Colonialism Among Midwestern Anishinaabe Communities Informs the MMIWG Crisis”
- Danielle Lennon: “History of Diagnosis and Treatment of Trauma: An Analysis of the Influence of the Vietnam Wars and a Case Study on Cambodian American Refugee Communities Relationship with Trauma from 1975 to 2021”
- Ayuka Sinanoglu: “Colonial Conquests: Soviet Subjugation of the Kalmyk Nomads”
- Reilly Coon: “From Mother to Monster, Protector to Perpetrator: Framing Pauline Nyiramasuhuko’s Antithetical Identities at the ICTR”
PANEL 4: THE MAKING OF THE MODERN WORLD
- Charles Pei: “World Wanderers: Organized Crime in a Post-Socialist Factory Town”
- Karlsson Qingze Zhao: “Hu Shi and May Fourth – A Dialogue with Revolution”
- Tyler Hengst: “Unreformed and Unwelcomed: The Growth of Calvinist Intolerance towards Catholics during the early Eighty Years’ War”
- Rachel Lynch: “From Cold War to Hot War: The Geopolitical Influence of Zbigniew Brzezinski on American Posture towards Afghanistan, 1978-1998”
