Simon D. Elin Fisher
Email: sdfisher2@wisc.edu
Address:
Advisor: A. Finn Enke
Curriculum Vitae (pdf) | Website

Biography
My research interests include histories and historical methods located at the intersections of (trans)gender, race, and sexuality, usually in the 20th century United States. I aim towards open and inclusive exchange in my academic and creative projects, and bring these aspirations into the classroom. I also teach academic writing skills to non-traditional adult students at the community college and university levels.
Education
M.A., University of Chicago
B.A., DePaul University
Field
- U.S./North American History; Gender and Women’s History
MA Title
- “Welcomed to the Spectacle: Looking at the Working Class, the Self-acting Machines, and the Indian Court at the Great Exhibition of 1851”
Working Dissertation Title
- “Queer Intimacies, Nonviolence, and the Making of the Civil Rights Movement”
Selected Publications
- “Challenging Dissemblance in Pauli Murray Historiography, Sketching a History of the Trans New Negro,” Journal of African American History, 104 (2019).
- Fisher, Simon D. Elin, Ido Katri, and Rasheedah Phillips, eds., Somatechnics – Trans Temporalities [special issue], 7.1 (2017).
- Fisher, Simon D. Elin, Ido Katri, and Rasheedah Phillips, “Introduction: Trans Temporalities,” Somatechnics – Trans Temporalities [special issue], 7.1 (2017).
- Review of The Firebrand and the First Lady: Portrait of a Friendship: Pauli Murray, Eleanor Roosevelt, and the Struggle for Social Justice, by Patricia Bell Scott, QED, 3.3 (2017).
- “Pauli Murray’s Peter Panic: Perspectives from the Margins of Race and Gender in Jim Crow America,” Transgender Studies Quarterly, 3.1 (2016).
- Review of Our Minds on Freedom: Women and the Struggle for Black Equality in Louisiana, 1924-1967, by Shannon Frystak, The Coordinating Council for Women in History Newsletter, 46.2 (May 2015): 12-13.
- Johnson, S., C. Hommerding, S. Fisher, and J. Lanner-Cusin, “Queer Wests: A Historiographical Conversation.” Western History Association Newsletter, Spring 2013.
Awards
- Vilas Conference Travel Award, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- Woodrow Wilson Women’s Studies Fellowship, Finalist
- Vilas Research Travel Award, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- George L. Mosse Graduate Fellowship in LGBT History, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- History Department Pre-dissertator Fellowship, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- Department Dissertator Research Travel Award, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- Dissertation Proposal Development Fellowship, Social Science Research Council
- LGBT Campus Center Fund, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Professional Affiliation
- Organization of American Historians 2014-present
- Canadian Committee on the History of Sexuality 2015-present
- Canadian Committee on Women’s History 2015-present
Courses Taught as TA
- History 102 – U.S. History, 1865-Present
- History 160 – Asian-American History: Migration and Dislocation
- FCS Writing Skills Initiative, Ryerson University (Toronto)
Courses Taught as Instructor
- HIS 854 – African American History (2019)
Ryerson University (Adjunct Professor) - Writing Skills Initiative (2015-present)
Ryerson University, Faculty of Community Service - JUS 362 – LGBT Issues and Politics (2011)
Northeastern Illinois University (Adjunct Professor) - ENG 098 “Foundational Writing” 2010-2011
Chicago City Colleges – Daley College (Adjunct Professor) - 25 Years of U.S. Feminism (2009)
Chicago Freedom School (Instructor)