Contents: This page contains information on the following:
- Education
- Academic Experience
- Fellowships and Grants
- Honors and Awards
- Publications
- Work in Progress
- Recent Presentations
- Courses Taught
- Consulting
- Professional Service
- Professional Memberships
- See Also
Education
- Ph.D., Harvard University, History, 1991, Dissertation: "British Mountaineering, 1850-1914." Advisor: Simon Schama
- M.A., Harvard University, History, 1986
- B.A., Carleton College, History, 1984, magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa
Academic Experience
- Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Professor of History, 2014--; Associate Professor, 1998-2013; Assistant Professor, 1992-1998; Director of International Studies, 1995--; Advisor for Undergraduate Awards, 2002-2013.
- Durham University, Institute of Advanced Study, Visiting Fellow, Michaelmas Term 2018
- Harvard University, Minda de Gunzberg Center for European Studies, Visiting Scholar, 2005-2006.
- Australian National University, Humanities Research Centre, Visiting Fellow, 1998.
- Clare Hall, University of Cambridge, Visiting Fellow, 1995-1996.
- Lehman College, City University of New York, Adjunct Assistant Professor, 1991-92.
- Institute of Historical Research, University of London, Visiting Member, 1988-1990.
Fellowships and Grants
- Durham University, Institute of Advanced Study, Visiting Fellowship, 2018
- Fulbright Scholar, U.S.-France International Education Administrators Program, 2017
- WPI-Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network, Teaching Grant, 2015-2016
- Australian National University, Humanities Research Centre, Visiting Fellowship, 1998.
- 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.
- National Endowment for the Humanities, Travel to Collections Grant, 1993, for research on British Mount Everest Expeditions, 1921-1953.
- Krupp Foundation Fellowship in European Studies, Harvard University, 1988-89, for doctoral dissertation research.
- New York City Urban Fellow, 1984-85, to work for the City of New York.
Honors and Awards
- 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 Prize, Graduate Essays, Harvard University, 1991.
Publications
Other Everests: One Mountain, Many Worlds, co-editors Paul Gilchrist, Peter H. Hansen, Jonathan Westaway, (Manchester University Press, 2024).
- ISBN: 9781526179166, MUP, Amazon US, Blackwells UK, Worldcat, Other Everests Contents
- DOI: 10.7765/9781526179173 for Open Access at Manchesterhive (Version of Record), and Open Access at Digital WPI, and OAPEN
- Book Extract at UK Climbing (31 March 2025) from Introduction to Other Everests
- Selected reviews of Other Everests: Asian Review of Books, Jan 2025; Professional Mountaineer, Spring 2025; Alpinist 89, Spring 2025.
The Summits of Modern Man: Mountaineering after the Enlightenment (Harvard University Press, 2013).
- ISBN: 9780674047990. HUP, Amazon US, De Gruyter, JSTOR Books, WorldCat
- Additional material for Summits of Modern Man at Digital WPI (bibliography, illustrations, and image gallery)
- Interview on New Books in Sports
- Selected reviews of Summits of Modern Man: Times Literary Supplement (July 26, 2013, TLS cover and lead review; in French in Books janvier 2014); Los Angeles Review of Books (June 9, 2013); Nature (May 23, 2013); Financial Times (May 10, 2013); The Hindu (May 27, 2013); The Scotsman (June 1, 2013); NRC Handelsblad (August 30, 2013); History Today (October 2013); Sydney Morning Herald (November 2, 2013); Choice (November 2013); Australian Geographic (Nov/Dec 2013); Reviews in History (January 2014); Journal of Historical Geography 43:1 (Jan 2014); Journal of Ecocriticism 6:1 (2014); American Alpine Journal 56 (2014); English Historical Review 129:540 (October 2014); American Historical Review 119:4 (2014); Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History 15:3 (Winter 2014); Journal of Sport History 41:3 (2014); The International Journal of the History of Sport 32:2 (2015); The Canadian Geographer/Le Géographe canadien 59:1 (2015); Canadian Journal of History/Annales canadiennes d'histoire 50:1 (2015); Time and Mind 8:2 (2015); Society and Space (2015); Journal of Modern History 87:3 (2015); Isis 106:3 (2015); Journal of World History 27:1 (2016); Himalaya 38:1 (2018).
"Q&A, Other Everests" in Alpinist 89, pp. 20-21. Extract from Alpinist podcast, "Other Everests: Hidden Histories & Contemporary Challenges," Dec 2024.
"Mountaineering in the Himalayas," in The Oxford Handbook of the Himalayas, edited by Amy Holmes-Tagchungdarpa, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2025).
Peter H. Hansen, Paul Gilchrist, and Jonathan Westaway, "Introduction: One Mountain, Many Worlds," in Other Everests: One Mountain, Many Worlds, edited by Gilchrist, Hansen, Westaway, (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2024), pp. 1-24. DOI:10.7765/9781526179173.00006, Open Access at Manchesterhive and DigitalWPI
"The Many Faces of a Mountain," in Everest 24: New Views on the 1924 Mount Everest Expedition, (Washington DC: Smithsonian Books, 2024), pp. 144-147.
"Scott, Douglas Keith (Doug) (1941-2020)," in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, edited by David Cannadine, (Oxford University Press, online edition, 8 April 2024). PDF. DOI:10.1093/odnb/9780198614128.013.90000381698
"Wildest Dreams of Everest and Modern Mountaineering," Les Sports Modernes: Société, Culture, Temporalité, Territoire 1 (2023): 59-67. PDF, DOI: 10.33055/SPORTSMODERNES.2023.001.01.61, Open Access at Libreo
"Commercialisation and Mount Everest in the Twentieth Century," in Rethinking Geographical Explorations in Extreme Environments: From the Arctic to the Mountain Tops, edited by Marco Armiero, Roberta Biasillo, Stefano Morosini, (New York: Routledge, July 2022), pp. 144-156. PDF. DOI:10.4324/9781003095965-10
"Upland on Mont Ventoux," in Mountain Dialogues from Antiquity to Modernity, edited by Dawn Hollis and Jason König, (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2021), pp. 215-227. PDF. DOI:10.5040/9781350162853.ch-012
"Tool User: Hobnailed Boots," Alpinist 74 (Summer 2021): 24. PDF
"Unsworth, Walt (1928-2017)," in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online edn, edited by David Cannadine, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, January 2021). PDF. DOI:10.1093/odnb/9780198614128.013.90000380378
"Y is for Yak," in Animalia: An Anti-Imperial Bestiary for Our Times, edited by Antoinette Burton and Renisa Mawani, (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2020), pp. 213-218. PDF. DOI:10.1215/9781478012818-026
"Tragedy on the Matterhorn," BBC History (July 2015): 58-61. PDF, Online at History Extra magazine
"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. PDF, DOI:10.1093/ref:odnb/96327
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ed., H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004):
- Bruce, Charles Granville (1866-1939), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32130
- Conway, (William) Martin, Baron Conway of Allington (1856-1937), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32536
- Coolidge, William Augustus Brevoort (1850-1926), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32545
- FitzGerald, Edward Arthur (1871-1931), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/64675
- Hargreaves, Alison Jane (1962-1995), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/58208
- Hinchliff, Thomas Woodbine (1825-1882), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/13332
- Jackson [née Sanderson], Margaret Anne (1843-1906), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/64719
- Le Blond [née Hawkins-Whitshed], Elizabeth Alice Frances (1860-1934), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/52565
- Mallory, George Herbert Leigh (1886-1924), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/34847
- Mason, Kenneth (1887-1976), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/62246
- Mummery, Albert Frederick (1855-1895), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/19526
- Noel, John Baptist Lucius (1890-1989), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/59068
- Pigeon, Anna (1832-1917), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/50648
- Pugh, (Lewis) Griffith Cresswell Evans (1909-1994), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/56001
- Richardson, (Sarah) Katharine [Katy] (1854-1927), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/60153
- Smith, Albert Richard (1816-1860), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/25768
- Stark, Dame Freya Madeline (1893?-1993), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/38280
- Straton, (Mary) Isabella Charlet- (1838-1918), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/60154
- Tenzing Norgay [known as Sherpa Tenzing] (1914-1986), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/50064
- Weston, Walter (1860-1940), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/64678
- Whymper, Edward (1840-1911), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/36884
- Wills, Sir Alfred (1828-1912), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/52559
- Young, Geoffrey Winthrop (1876-1958), doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/37073
"Why is there no subaltern studies for Tibet?" Tibet Journal 28:4 (Winter 2003): 7-22. PDF, Stable URL at JSTOR
"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). PDF, doi:10.1353/cch.2002.0012 and Project Muse.
"Interdisciplinary Student Projects in Thailand," Tai Culture: International Review on Tai Cultural Studies 7 (June 2002): 176-177. PDF
"Unofficial Notes on the Gates Cambridge Scholarship," National Association of Fellowship Advisors: the NAFA Newsletter 4 (March 2002).
"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. PDF, DOI:10.7765/9781526119629.00009
"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. PDF
"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. PDF
"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. PDF, 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 Persee.fr
"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. PDF
"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. PDF doi:10.1093/past/157.1.159 and JSTOR Stable URL
"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. PDF, doi:10.2307/2169420 or JSTOR Stable URL. 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 24:1 (1996): 48-71. PDF, doi: 10.1080/03086539608582968 Reprinted in John Marriott, ed., Routledge Historical Resources: Empire (Routledge, 2022)
"International Education and Sustainable Development: An American Experience in Bangkok, Venice, and Guayaquil,"" The Environmentalist 15, 4 (1995): 252-256. PDF 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. PDF, PDF, doi:10.1086/386080, JSTOR Stable URL. Translated and reprinted, above.
Recent book reviews:
Review of Julie Rak, False Summit: Gender in Mountaineering Nonfiction (Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press, 2021), for Journal of the Austrian Association for American Studies 2:2 (2021) doi:10.47060/jaaas.v2i2.144
Review of Susan Barton, Internment in Switzerland during the First World War (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2019), for American Historical Review, 126:2 (2021): 869-870. doi:10.1093/ahr/rhab315
Review of Martyn Lyons, The Pyrenees in the Modern Era: Reinventions of a Landscape, 1775-2012 (Bloomsbury Academic, 2018), for European History Quarterly 49:4 (2019): 699-701. doi:10.1177/0265691419877354i
Review of Daniel C. Taylor, Yeti: The Ecology of a Mystery (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2017), for Pacific Affairs 91:4 (December 2018): 832-834, Pacific Affairs online.
Review of Tait Keller, Apostles of the Alps: Mountaineering and Nation Building Germany and Austria, 1860-1939 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2016), for Journal of Modern History (June 2017), 476-478. doi:10.1086/691514, JSTOR
Review of Bernard Debarbieux and Gilles Rudaz, The Mountain: A Political History from the Enlightenment to the Present (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015), The AAG Review of Books 4:3 (July 2016): 121-123. doi: 10.1080/2325548X.2016.1187488
Review of Ted Binnema, Enlightened Zeal: The Hudson's Bay Company and Scientific Networks, 1670-1870 (Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 2014), American Historical Review 120:2 (April 2015): 610-611. doi: 10.1093/ahr/120.2.610
Review of Diana L. DiStefano, Encounters in Avalanche Country: A History of Survival in the Mountain West, 1820-1929 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2013), for New Mexico Historical Review 89:4 (Fall 2014): 532-533. NMH Open Journals
Review of Fredrik Albritton Jonsson, Enlightenment's Frontier: The Scottish Highlands and the Origins of Environmentalism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013), for Environmental History 19:2 (April 2014): 399-401. doi:10.1093/envhis/emu017
Review of Ann C. Colley, Victorians in the Mountains: Sinking the Sublime (Burlington: Ashgate, 2010), for Victorian Studies 54:2 (2012): 334-336. doi:10.2979/victorianstudies.54.2.334 or Project Muse
Book Reviews also in Journal of British Studies, Journal of Historical Geography, Himalaya, Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History, H-Albion Discussion List in British and Irish History, International Labor and Working-Class History, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, World History Bulletin
Work in Progress
Work in progress is devoted to several areas: the whiteness of Mount Everest, sports and the modern world, and environmental history.
Recent Presentations/Podcasts/Videos
Other Everests: Hidden Histories & Contemporary Challenges, with Abbey Collins, Jonathan Westaway, and Sarah Pickman, episode on Alpinist Podcast, December 2, 2024. Podcast episode also on Apple and Spotify, and Q&A extract published in Alpinist 89.
Other Everests book launch, Kendal Mountain Festival, Kendal, UK, November 24, 2024.
"Other Everests, Other Alps," Keynote address to the congress on "The Alps and Asia/Asia and the Alps: interconnected mountain regions," Bern and Fribourg, Switzerland, June 2024.
"Climbing the Mountains of Modernity," Guest appearance in episode of Genealogies of Modernity, Season 2, episode 1, released November 9, 2023, Podcast link.
"The Whiteness of Mount Everest," Keynote address to AHRC Network Other Everests: Commemoration, Memory and Meaning and the British Everest Expedition Centenaries, 2021-2024, London, July 2022. Watch: YouTube
"Yaks," Friends of High Park Zoo, Toronto, FHPZ Zooviews Interviews with Animal Experts. July 17, 2021. Watch: YouTube
Global School Virtual Event Series: EUROPE, Event co-host, and moderator for the panel "Outlook for European Business and the Global Economy Post-Pandemic," April 21, 2021. Program, and Watch: YouTube
"A Model for Global Project-Based Learning," QS Idea Snack Webinars with higher education professionals on leveraging international partnerships to help universities through the COVID-19 crisis, June 2020, Watch/Listen: Podcast
"COVID-19 IQP Project Presentations," May 2020. Watch: YouTube
"Tales From the Top: A Panel Discussion on the Commercialization of Mount Everest", Moderator, Museum of Science, Boston, February 5, 2018. Watch on Youtube
Teaching
Current Courses Taught: see also courses and projects at WPI.
INTL 1100. Introduction to International and Global Studies
INTL 2100. Approaches to Global Studies
INTL 2510. Contemporary Europe: Union and Disunion
INTL 2910. Topics in Global Studies: Global Sports
INTL 3050. Global Re-entry Seminar
INTL 4100. Senior Seminar in International and Global Studies
HI 2329. European Empires: British Empire
HU 3900. Inquiry Seminar on the History of Sports
HU 3900. Inquiry Seminar on Global StudiesRecent student projects. Visit Digital WPI to view student projects at WPI advised by Peter Hansen.
Television, Radio, and Consulting
"The only way is up: A history of mountaineering," The Forum, BBC World Service, July 27, 2024, Programme site, and Recording on BBC Sounds.
Commentator, "Battle for the Himalayas: The Fight to Film Everest, BBC Four, Timeshift Series 14:4, director Steve O'Hagan, 2015. Broadcast BBC1 January 29, 2015. IMdB. See Preview clips.
Historical Commentator for "The Misfit and the Matterhorn," a BBC Television program in the series on "Mountain Men: Tall Tales and High Adventure," director Mick Conefrey, 2001. Broadcast BBC2, May 31, 2001. Vimeo
Commentator and Historical Consultant, "Reputations Hillary and Tenzing: Everest and After," in BBC "Reputations" series, Season 4, Episode 3, director David Upshal, 1997. Broadcast June 18, 1997 BBC2, rebroadcast the History Channel. Youtube
Associate Editor, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ed., H.C.G. Matthew, (Oxford University Press, 2004).
Editor, NACBS Forum on The Making of the Working British Historian, 2000.
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.
Manuscript referee, proposal reviewer or promotion reviewer for a wide variety of journals, publishers, granting agencies and universities.
Academic Administration and Service
Professional Service
- Worcester World Affairs Council, President, 2023-2025; Vice President, 2021-2023; Director, 2016-2025
- North East Conference of British Studies, President, 2005-2007. Vice-President and Program Chair, 2003-2005. Secretary-Treasurer, 1996-2001
- North American Conference on British Studies, Council (ex officio), 2006-2007, Webmaster, 1999-2003.
Academic Administration and Service to Global Programs and Global Studies
- Director of International and Global Studies, WPI, 1995--. Responsible for an interdisciplinary major and minor in International and Global Studies.
- Copenhagen Denmark Project Center, WPI, Director, 2020--; Co-Director 2018-2020
- Lyon France Project Center, WPI, Co-Director 2018-2020
- Many more
Service for Inclusion and Belonging
- WPI Institutional Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Leadership Council, 2019-2021
- Co-Chair, Project Inclusion, Rubric Steering Committee, WPI, 2017-2018
Service for Revision of Faculty Promotion Policies
Other WPI Service
- Chair, Committee on Appointments and Promotion (2016-2017), Led three-year effort to change the policies for Promotion to Full Professor by broadening the criteria to include multiple forms of scholarship
- Co-Chair (with John McNeill) Task Force on Academic Promotion (2015-2016). Wrote report proposing modifications of promotion criteria, procedures, and mentoring
- Co-chair (with John Orr) COAP ad hoc committee on the COACHE Survey (2014)
Advisor for Undergraduate Awards, WPI, 2001-2013. Nominated students for nationally competitive fellowships and scholarships. WPI students received multiple Marshall, Goldwater, Rotary, Fulbright, Gates Cambridge, National Science Foundation Scholarships, Society of Women Engineers scholarships, and others.
WPI Department of Humanities and Arts service includes interim head, associate head, and department council, promotion, tenure, and search committees.
Past WPI service includes the Committee on Appointments and Promotions, 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, global initiatives, academic promotion, global competency and multicultural inclusion. Advisor for student groups including Alpha Phi Omega, the Outing Club, Debate Team, and others.
Other public service includes Wesley United Methodist Church, Boy Scouts of America, and Elm Park Center for Early Childhood Education.
Professional Memberships
- American Historical Association
- American Society for Environmental History
- Association for Asian Studies
- Association of Nepal and Himalayan Studies
- North American Conference of British Studies
- North American Society for Sports History
- Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers)
- Royal Historical Society
See Also
WPI Homepage