Biography
I am a scholar of the French Revolution and the Atlantic world in the Age of Revolutions, with a focus on how the Haitian Revolution and revolutions in the Windward Islands impacted political and social conflict in the French metropole. I investigate how revolutionaries from various social, racial, and geographic backgrounds intervened in debates about colonial issues and integrated questions about race, free trade, and Caribbean counter-revolution into their broader understanding of the French Revolution and its global importance. My research interrogates the ways in which popular and provincial politics in France intersected with colonial issues.
In my master’s thesis, I analyze the political career of Pierre Chaumette, a leading figure in revolutionary Paris during the Terror who led the Paris municipality in supporting the abolition of slavery throughout the French colonial empire in February 1794. I track Chaumette’s unorthodox political trajectory throughout the Revolution alongside his abolitionist activism to illustrate how political actors from non-elite backgrounds also intervened in colonial politics and sought to transform the French colonial empire as a crucial element of national regeneration.
My dissertation, Imperial Jacobins : Colonialism, Revolution, and Local Politics in France’s Atlantic Ports, analyzes how revolutionaries in France’s leading Atlantic port cities intervened in colonial issues from the beginning of the Revolution to the end of the Thermidorian Convention (1789-1795). I show how port-city revolutionaries, acting through local institutions including municipal councils, local Jacobin Clubs, and Revolutionary Tribunals, contested issues ranging from the abolition of slavery to the treatment of colonial refugees. By studying these revolutionaries, I not only seek to show how non-elite actors shaped colonial debates and policies, but also how port-city revolutionaries situated colonial politics in relation to other issues such as the boundaries of public debate, the meaning of counter-revolution, and the prosecution of the Terror.
Education
M.A., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2020
B.A., Rutgers University New Brunswick, 2017
Field
- European History
MA Title
- “Pierre-Gaspard Chaumette: Abolitionist Activism and Colonialist Politics in Revolutionary Paris.”
Working Dissertation Title
- ” Imperial Jacobins : Colonialism, Revolution, and Local Politics in France’s Atlantic Ports”
Selected Awards
- Natalie Zemon Davis Award – Society for French Historical Studies, 2023
- Excellence in Teaching Award – UW-Madison History Department, 2023
- Institut français d’Amérique Gilbert Chinard Fellowship, Society for French Historical Studies, 2023
- Bourse Marandon – Société des Professeurs Français et Francophones d’Amérique, 2021
- Kate Everest Levi Second-Year Paper Prize for best Master’s thesis – UW-Madison History Department, 2020
- Foreign Language Area Studies Grant for one summer and one academic year of Portuguese language instruction – UW-Madison Graduate School, 2019 ; 2020
Professional Affiliations
- French Colonial Historical Society (FCHS) – Early Career Scholar
- Society for French Historical Studies (SFHS)
- Western Society for French History (WSFH)
- American Historical Association (AHA)
Courses Taught as TA
- History 119: Europe 1400 to 1800
- History of Science 201: The Origins of Scientific Thought
- History 201: Historian’s Craft – Pirates and Renegades in the Early Modern Mediterranean
- History 201: Historian’s Craft – The French Revolution
- Guest lecture : “Victor Hugues : Race, Terror, and Liberty in the Revolutionary Atlantic (1789-1805),” given Dec. 5, 2022