Graduate Students
Ph.D Candidates
Allison Bennett
B.A. (Hons.), Memorial University, 2013
M.A. (History), Memorial University, 2014
B. Ed (Intermediate/Secondary), Memorial University, 2015
Research Interests: History of War and Society; History of Gender and Sexuality; History of Medicine
Current Research: My doctoral research examines British, Australian, and New Zealand servicemen’s sexual encounters with civilian women in First World War Egypt, Palestine, Mesopotamia, and Macedonia, and how these encounters and resulting cases of venereal disease were understood according to imperial perceptions of race, gender, sexuality, and health. In analyzing the nature of these wartime sexual encounters and how they were policed and managed, I show that these encounters stressed pseudoscientific ideas about race and male and female bodies; challenged the white heterosexual male and his imperial and military identity; and called into question servicemen’s veteran pensions.
Supervisor: Dr. Justin Fantauzzo
Mariah Cooper
B.A. History, Trent University, 2014
B.Ed., Queen's University, 2016
M.A., History, Memorial University of Newfoundland, 2017
Research Interests: Medieval women's history and gender studies; medieval memory construction; medieval literature
Current Research: Examining fourteenth-century courtly romances' representations of elite women and comparing them to the rights and positions of similar real-life noblewomen in French and English societies. Through a combined examination of legal, conduct and religious texts as well as the lives of extraordinary women, my research objectives are to expose the hidden truths about medieval female identities embedded within these presumed fictional tales.
Co-Supervisors: Dr. Sébastien Rossignol and Dr. John Geck
Rod De Oliveira Miranda
Supervisor: Dr. Sébastien Rossignol
Deborah George
Supervisor: Dr. Stephan Curtis
Stewart Lawrence
B.A. in History, Sam Houston State University, 2018
M.A. in History, Memorial University of Newfoundland, 2020
Research Interests:
Social History, Swedish History, Labour History, Gender History, Economic History and the History of Industrialisation, Urban History
Current Research: My dissertation research focuses on the role of alcohol consumption in the formation of a working-class identity within the taverns of late nineteenth-century Stockholm. As part of my analysis, I focus on the “weapons of the weak” and “economy of makeshifts” employed by the lower classes as they attempted to carve out a living within the capital city’s transforming economy and shifting urban environment in the wake of industrialisation. This includes the stratification of the working class and its diverging culture, gender roles and gendered work, placemaking in working-class taverns and neighbourhoods, and the contested space of Stockholm’s Gamla Stan.
Supervisor: Dr. Stephan Curtis
Gene Long
M.A. History, Memorial University, 1993
Current Interests: Archival framing of the Labrador Boundary Decision of 1927.
Supervisor: Dr. Sean Cadigan
Matt Papai
B.A. History, The Ohio State University, 2010.
M.A. History, University of Alberta, 2014.
Research Interests: Cultural History, Environmental History, Food/Alcohol, Tourism, and Public History.
Current Research: The focus of my research is the role of consumable products and commodities within the tourist experience, specifically the investigation of how certain consumable commodities have gathered tourist attention, and what these commodities represent to local populations. I am also interested in the ways in which specific foods and drinks contribute to the formation of cultural identity on national, regional, and local scales.
Supervisor: Dr. Dominique Brégent-Heald
Christopher Reid
M.A. History, Memorial University, 2014
Research Interests: First World War; British Empire at War; War & Society; Newfoundland History.
Current Project: Islands at War: First World War Experience and Memory in Britain's Atlantic Realm, 1914-1939. My research will analyze soldiers' experiences of the First World War and their collective memorization of the war within three, war-raised battalions from Newfoundland, the British West Indies, and Northern Ireland.
Supervisor: Dr. Justin Fantauzzo
Norman B. Potter
B.A. History, Mount Royal University, 2016
Research Interests: American cultural history, Mexican-American relations, borderlands, Canadian cultural history
Current Research: Popular construction of the Calgary Stampede.
Supervisor: Dr. Dominique Brégent-Heald
M.A. Candidates
Rachel Barnes
Supervisor: Dr. Justin Fantauzzo
Philip-Antoine Breau
B.A. Histoire, Université de Montréal, 2021
Research Interests: First World War, Military History, History of medicine
Current Research: My research project will focus on how the Armée d'Orient, the French army deployed on the Macedonian front during the First World War, reacted to the malaria epidemics that affected its soldiers throughout the war. It will examine the effectiveness of the antimalarial policies put in place by the Armée d'Orient.
Supervisor: Dr. Justin Fantauzzo
Travis Brown
Supervisor: Dr. Neil Kennedy
Bruna Cardoso 
B.A. Communication and Journalism, IELUSC - Brazil
Research Interests: Environmental history and Indigenous history.
Current Research: Researching sites of oil exploration near Indigenous communities.
Supervisor: Dr. John Sandlos
Ryan Chafe
Supervisor: Dr. Jim Connor
Joshua James Cullinane
B.A. (Honors), MUN, 2019
Research Interests: Alcohol Studies, Film Studies, American History
Current Research: I am studying the portrayal of alcoholism in Hollywood film noir movies in the 1940s and 1950s.
Supervisor: Dr. Dominique Brégent-Heald
John Davis-Abraham
B.A. (Honours) History/Religious Studies, 2020
Research Interests: Latin American history; American foreign intervention; Guatemalan Civil War (1960-1996); Counterinsurgency; Governmental dissent.
Current Research: My research project aims to examine American diplomats, policy-makers and officials who criticized US policy choices in Guatemala during the 1960-1996 Guatemalan Civil War. Using recently declassified American government documents, my research will meaningfully contribute to scholarship on US policy in Guatemala by revealing that policy-makers were not unanimous in their approach and some were deeply critical of US complicity in extreme violence.
Supervisor: Dr. Michael Kirkpatrick
Donovan Fifield
B.A. History, University of Connecticut, 2017
Research Interests: Early American History, Maritime History, Early Modern Political Economy
Current Project: My research will focus on the effect of mercantile credit relations on the development of financial systems and institutions in New England. Included in this investigation are the effects of the emergence of dominant firms and the experience of maritime laborers.
Supervisor: Dr. Neil Kennedy
Roza Gabdullina
M.A. Candidate, Memorial University
Research Interests: Medieval Scandinavia, Natural Resources
Current Research: Natural Resources in Medieval Scandinavia, According to Latin Sources. The research topic of my MA is the distribution of natural resources in Scandinavia during the 9th-13th centuries. I study the ways of using natural resources and their impact on the life of the settlements and on the environment of this period.
Supervisor: Dr. Sébastien Rossignol
Kyle Johnson
B.A. (Honours) History, Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, 2021
Research Interests: Cultural History, Colonialism/Post-Colonialism, Race/Race Relations, Slavery
Current Research: Inspecting American and Caribbean plantation slavery, generally between the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Specifically, I aim to investigate how American slave society reinforced particular power structures, and how race and class interacted within that power structure.
Supervisor: Dr. Neil Kennedy
Patrick Kennedy
Supervisor: Dr. Jim Connor
Bryan Marsh
B.A (History), Memorial University, 2005
B.Ed. (Intermediate Secondary) Memorial University, 2008
Certificate in Newfoundland Studies, Memorial University, 2005
Research Interests: Newfoundland and Labrador History, Forest History, Transportation History, the Vietnam War, 19th and 20th Century World History.
Current Project: Tentative, “A Grim and Costly Business”: The Decline of the Pulp and Paper, and Pulpwood Harvesting Industry in Central Newfoundland 1959-2009.
Supervisor: Dr. Sean Cadigan
Bryan Poirier
Supervisor: Dr. Neil Kennedy
Tyler Ross
Supervisor: Dr. Sébastien Rossignol
Jessica Van Bussel
Supervisor: Dr. Justin Fantauzzo
Christopher Winsor
B.A. History (Honours), Memorial University, 2021
Research Interests: British Empire, Colonial Knowledge, Racial Ideology, Frontiers and Borderlands
Current Research: My research explores the intersection of race and colonial power in nineteenth-century British Honduras (present-day Belize). It examines how colonial authorities used racial categorization to make sense of, and assert control over, the colony’s northern frontier as it was ethnically and politically reconfigured by the arrival of refugees fleeing the Caste War of Yucatán.
Supervisor: Dr. Michael Kirkpatrick