Contents: This page contains information on the
following:
- Ph.D., Harvard University,
History, 1991, Dissertation: "British
Mountaineering, 1850-1914."
- M.A., Harvard University, History, 1986
- B.A., Carleton College,
History, 1984, magna cum laude
- Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Associate Professor
of History, 1998--; Assistant Professor, 1992-1998; Director of International
Studies, 1995--; Advisor for Undergraduate Awards, 2000--.
- Harvard University, Minda de
Gunzberg Center for European Studies, Visiting Scholar, 2005-06.
- Australian National University,
Humanities Research Centre, Visiting Fellow, 1998.
- Clare Hall, University of
Cambridge, Visiting Fellow, 1995-96.
- Lehman College, City University
of New York, Adjunct Assistant Professor, 1991-92.
- Institute of Historical Research,
University of London, Visiting Member, 1988-90.
- WPI
Teaching with Technology Fellowship, 2002-04.
- Australian National University,
Humanities Research Centre, Visiting Fellowship, 1998.
- Royal Geographical Society (with the
Institute of British Geographers), Young Researcher Award, to present
a paper at the RGS/IBG annual conference, 1996.
- National Endowment for the
Humanities, Fellowship for College Teachers, 1995-96, for research on
the history of British mountaineering to 1953.
- Clare Hall, University of
Cambridge, Visiting Fellowship, 1995-96.
- WPI Interface Discipline Initiative, Principal Investigator, International Studies, 1994-95, to develop a new,
interdisciplinary program in International Studies.
- National Endowment for the Humanities, Travel to Collections Grant,
1993, for research in London on the British Mount Everest Expeditions,
1921-1953.
- Krupp Foundation Fellowship in European
Studies, Harvard University,
1988-89, for doctoral dissertation research in Europe.
- New York City Urban
Fellow, 1984-85, to work for the City of New
York.
- Walter D. Love Prize, North
American Conference on British Studies, 2001. Awarded for
the best article in any field of British studies published during 2000 to
"Confetti of Empire: the Conquest of Everest in Nepal, India,
Britain, and New Zealand," Comparative Studies in Society and
History 42 (April 2000): 307-332.
- Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, 1997.
- Bowdoin Graduate Dissertation Prize, Harvard University, 1990-91.
- Carleton College: Phi Beta Kappa; Distinction in History;
Interdisciplinary Concentration in Political Economy; Honors in
Independent Study, 1984.
The Summits of Modern Man: Mountaineering after the Enlightenment (Harvard University Press, May 2013). ISBN: 9780674047990.
HUP,
Amazon,
B&N
"Founders of the Alpine Club (act. 1857–1863)," in
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online ed., edited by Lawrence
Goldman. Oxford: Oxford University Press, October 2007.
Online at ODNB
"Bruce,
Charles Granville (1866-1939)," "Conway, (William) Martin, Baron Conway of Allington
(1856-1937)," "Coolidge, William Augustus Brevoort (1850-1926)," "FitzGerald,
Edward Arthur (1871-1931)," "Hargreaves, Alison Jane (1962-1995)," "Hinchliff,
Thomas Woodbine (1825-1882)," "Jackson [née Sanderson], Margaret
Anne (1843-1906)," "Le Blond [née Hawkins-Whitshed], Elizabeth
Alice Frances (1860-1934)," "Mallory, George Herbert Leigh (1886-1924)," "Mason,
Kenneth (1887-1976)," "Mummery, Albert Frederick (1855-1895)," "Noel, John
Baptist Lucius (1890-1989)," "Pigeon, Anna (1832-1917)," "Pugh, (Lewis) Griffith
Cresswell Evans (1909-1994)," "Richardson, (Sarah) Katharine [Katy]
(1854-1927)," "Smith, Albert Richard (1816-1860)," "Stark, Dame Freya Madeline
(1893?-1993)," "Straton, (Mary) Isabella Charlet- (1838-1918)," "Tenzing Norgay
[known as Sherpa Tenzing] (1914-1986)," "Weston, Walter (1860-1940)," "Whymper,
Edward (1840-1911)," "Wills, Sir Alfred (1828-1912)," and "Young, Geoffrey
Winthrop (1876-1958)," in Oxford Dictionary of National
Biography, ed., H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2004).
"Why is there no subaltern studies for Tibet?"
Tibet
Journal 28:4 (Winter 2003): 7-22.
"Georges Mallory et la masculinité," in Deux siècles
d'alpinismes européens, origines et mutations des activités
de grimpe, ed. Olivier Hoibian and Jacques Defrance, (Paris: L'Harmattan,
2002), pp. 135-46. PDF
"Mallory et la masculinité,"
Cimes, L’Everest dans tous ses états,
Groupe de Haute Montagne Annales
2002 (2002): 173-76.
"Ornamentalism and Orientalism: Virtual Empires and the Politics
of Knowledge," Journal
of Colonialism and Colonial History 3:1 (Spring 2002). doi:10.1353/cch.2002.0012
and URL
at Project Muse.
"Interdisciplinary Student Projects in Thailand," Tai
Culture: International Review on Tai Cultural Studies 7 (June 2002):
176-7. PDF
"Unofficial Notes on the Gates Cambridge Scholarship,"
National Association of
Fellowship Advisors: the NAFA Newsletter 4 (March 2002). URL
on-line.
"Coronation Everest: Empire and Commonwealth in the ‘Second
Elizabethan Age’," in
British Culture and
the End of Empire, ed. Stuart Ward, (Manchester: Manchester
University Press, 2001), pp. 57-72.
Google Books (limited
preview)
"Tibetan Horizon: Tibet and the Cinema in the Early Twentieth
Century," in Imagining
Tibet: Perceptions, Projections, and Fantasies, ed. Thierry Dodin
and Heinz Räther, (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2001), pp.
91-110. Google
Books (limited preview)
"Modern Mountains: the Performative Consciousness of Modernity in
Britain, 1870-1940," in Meanings
of Modernity: Britain in the Age of Imperialism and World Wars,
ed. Martin J. Daunton and Bernhard Rieger, (Oxford: Berg, and New York:
NYU Press, 2001), pp. 185-202.
Google Books (limited
preview)
"Confetti of Empire: the Conquest of Everest in Nepal, India, Britain
and New Zealand,"
Comparative
Studies in Society and History, 42 (April 2000): 307-332.
doi:10.1017/S0010417500002486 and
Stable URL at JSTOR.
"Albert Smith, l'Alpine Club, et l'invention de l'alpinisme au milieu
de l'ère victorienne," STAPS: Revue internationale
des sciences du sport et de l'éducation physique vol. 21,
n. 51 (Hiver 2000): 7-28. PDF
"Partners: Guides and Sherpas in the Alps and Himalayas,
1850s-1950s,"
in Voyages
and Visions: Towards a Cultural History of Travel, ed. Jas Elsner
and Joan-Pau Rubies, (London: Reaktion, 1999), pp. 210-231.
Google Books (limited
preview)
"Debate: Tenzing's Two Wrist-Watches: the Conquest of Everest and
Late Imperial Culture in Britain, 1921-1953, Comment," Past and Present 157 (Nov. 1997): 159-177.
doi:10.1093/past/157.1.159 and
Stable URL at JSTOR.
"Der tibetische Horizont. Tibet im Kino des frühen 20.
Jahrhunderts," in Mythos
Tibet: Wahrnehmungen, Projektionen, Phantasien, Kunst- und
Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Bonn, with Thierry Dodin
and Heinz Räther eds., (Cologne: DuMont Verlag, 1997), pp. 87-103. PDF
"The Dancing Lamas of Everest: Cinema, Orientalism, and Anglo-Tibetan
Relations in the 1920s," American
Historical Review 101 (June 1996): 712-744.
doi:10.1086/ahr/101.3.712
and Stable
URL at JSTOR. Reprinted in
Alex McKay, ed., The History of Tibet,
3 vols. (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003).
"Vertical Boundaries, National Identities: Victorian Mountaineering on
the Frontiers of Europe and the Empire, 1868-1914,"
Journal of Imperial and
Commonwealth History 24 (1996): 48-71.
doi:
10.1080/03086539608582968
"International Education and Sustainable Development: An American
Experience in Bangkok, Venice, and Guayaquil,"" The Environmentalist
15, 4 (1995): 252-256.
doi:10.1007/BF01902246
"Mountaineering," in Twentieth-Century Britain: an Encyclopedia,
ed., F.M. Leventhal, (New York: Garland, 1995), pp. 536-537.
"Albert Smith, the Alpine Club, and the Invention of Mountaineering in
Mid-Victorian Britain," Journal of British
Studies 34 (July 1995): 300-324.
doi:10.1086/386080 and
Stable
URL at JSTOR. Translated and reprinted,
above.
Recent book reviews:
Review of Ann C. Colley, Victorians in the Mountains: Sinking the Sublime (Burlington: Ashgate, 2010),
or Victorian Studies 54:2 (2012): 334-336. DOI: 10.1353/vic.2012.0010 or Project Muse
Review of Gordon T. Stewart, Journeys to Empire:
Enlightenment, Imperialism and the British Encounter with Tibet, 1774-1904
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), for Journal of British Studies,
49 (July 2010): 729-730. DOI:
10.1086/652257
Review of Maurice Isserman and Stewart Weaver, Fallen Giants: A History of
Himalayan Mountaineering from the Age of Empire to the Age of Extremes (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 2008), for Journal of British Studies 48 (July
2009): 798-800. DOI: 10.1086/604789
Review of Julie G. Marshall, Britain and Tibet, 1765-1947: a select bibliography
of British relations with Tibet and the Himalayan states including Nepal, Sikkim
and Bhutan, revised and updated to 2003 (New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2005), in
Himalaya 26 (2006 [publication May 2009]): 59-60.
Journal website
Review of Jonathan Finch and Kate Giles, eds., Estate Landscapes: Design,
Improvement and Power in the Post-Medieval Landscape, Society for Post-Medieval
Archaeology Monograph 4. (Woodbridge, Suffolk, and Rochester, NY: Boydell and
Brewer, 2007), for H-Albion Discussion List in British and Irish History
(February 2009).
http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=23004
Review of W.B. Carnochan, The Sad Story of Burton, Speke, and the Nile; or, was
John Hanning Speke a Cad? Looking at the Evidence (Stanford: Stanford
University Press, 2006), and Dane Kennedy, The Highly Civilized Man: Richard
Burton and the Victorian World (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005),
for Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History 9:2 (Fall 2008).
Project Muse
Review of Ian J. Barrow, Making History, Drawing Territory: British Mapping in
India, c. 1756-1905 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003), in Journal of
British Studies 45 (January 2006): 184-6.
DOI: 10.1086/500882
Book Reviews also in Journal of
Historical Geography, International Labor and Working-Class History,
Journal of Imperial
and Commonwealth History, World History Bulletin
Work in progress is devoted to three areas: a book on the cultural history of Everest; essays
about western encounters with Tibet in the twentieth century, and historical approaches to climate change and the Anthropocene.
"Mountaineering and the Sovereignty of Modern Man," ISSA World Congress of Sociology of Sport, Vancouver, June 2013.
"Summits of Modern Man: Mountaineering after the Enlightenment," Institute of Historical Research, London, May 2013.
"Courage and Science: the Politics of Remembering Saussure’s
Ascent of Mont Blanc during the Early Third Republic," Society for French Historical Studies, April 2013.
"What is Enlightenment? The Ascents of Mont Blanc," Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, Morocco, October 2010.
"Discovery of the Glacières: Making Up Mont Blanc,"
Nature's Publics: The Making of
Publics for Knowledge of the Natural World in Europe, 1500-1800, McGill
University, Montreal, March 2010.
"On the Edge of a Cliff: Mont Blanc and the French Revolution," American
Society of Environmental History, March 2007.
"Roundtable: Unstable Spaces and Conceptual Borderlands: Envisioning (Post-)Colonial
Futures after the First World War," American Historical Association,
January 2007.
Chair/Commentator, "Imagining the Past, 1780-1870," North American Conference on British Studies,
Boston, November, 2006.
"Mountaineering and Modernity," Center for European Studies, Harvard
University, September 2005.
Program Chair, North East Conference on British Studies, 2005 Annual Meeting,
University of Massachusetts, Amherst, October 2005.
Program Chair, North East Conference on British Studies,
2004 Annual Meeting, McGill University, Montreal, October 2004.
Courses Taught: see also courses and projects at
WPI.
Industry and Empire in British History, 1688 to present.
Introduction to European Social and Economic History: The Industrial
Revolution.
Topics in Modern European History.
Topics in Imperial and Postcolonial History.
Senior Seminar in International Studies.
Pro-Seminar in Global Perspectives.
Europe Since World War I.
Europe Since the French Revolution.
Europe Since 1945.
British History, 1780-1950.
The British Empire, 1757-c.1930.
Britain and France, 1750-1980.
World History Since 1500.
Advisor to research projects and
inquiry seminars in
history
on campus as well as London and Morocco,
Interactive Projects on the interaction of science/technology and society at
London,
Bangkok,
Washington, DC, and
Worcester, and Major Projects (equivalent to a senior thesis) in
international studies and history. My students have received the President's IQP Award, the Provost's MQP Award, and the Class of 1879 Prize in the
Humanities.
Historical consultant to Massachusetts
Foundation for the Humanities, for a discussion series at public libraries
on "Desperate Journeys: True Stories of Endurance and Survival,"
2000-2001.
Historical Commentator for "The Misfit and the Matterhorn," a BBC Television program in the series on
"Mountain Men: Tall Tales and High Adventure," 2000-01. Broadcast BBC2, May 31, 2001.
Historical Consultant and Commentator, "Hillary and Tenzing:
Everest and After," a BBC
Television program in the "Reputations" series, produced by
the BBC Documentary Department, 1996-97. The program was broadcast June
18, 1997 on BBC2, and on the History Channel after April, 1998.
Associate Editor, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ed., H.C.G. Matthew, (Oxford
University Press, 2004).
Manuscript Referee for Journal of British Studies, Cultural Geographies,
The Historian, Social and Cultural Geography, Western
Historical Quarterly, Journal of Canadian Studies, Comparative
Literature Studies, Longmans Publishing, and Oxford University Press.
Editor, “NACBS Forum: The Making of the Working British Historian,” http://www.nacbs.org/forum/index.html,
2000.
North East Conference of
British Studies, President, 2005-07. Vice-President and Program Chair, 2003-05. Secretary-Treasurer, 1996-2001.
North American Conference on
British Studies, Webmaster, 1999-2003, Council (ex officio), 2006-07.
WPI Director of International Studies, WPI, 1995--. Responsible for an interdisciplinary major and minor in International Studies.
WPI Advisor for Undergraduate Awards, WPI, 2000--. See Fellowships
and Scholarships.
WPI Department of Humanities and Arts,
including interim head, associate head, and department council, promotion, tenure, and faculty
search committees.
Other service at WPI includes the Committee on Governance, Committee on
Academic Policy, Undergraduate Outcomes Assessment Committee, Women's Programs Steering Committee, Presidential Commissions
or Task Forces on the humanities and arts, first-year programs and general
education requirements.
WPI Homepage
Peter Hansen's Homepage
phansen@wpi.edu