Dissertations & Theses | DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY | Memorial University of Newfoundland

Memorial University and the Department of History provide all of the resources necessary for the successful completion of Masters and Ph.D. degrees in history. To see what our recent students have accomplished view the lists of completed M.A. theses and Ph.D. dissertations below.

Masters Theses and Major Research Papers since 2010

2019

Margo Connors-Stack, Plebian Born: An Examination of the Life of T.M. White (1861-1938) (Supervisor: T. Bishop-Stirling)
Miranda Burrage-Goodwin, "Baleia á Vista, Whale in Sight": Whaling and Tourism in the Azores, 1750 to Present (Supervisor: J. Sandlos)
Jean-Phillippe Dubois, "Forward! For the Rescue of the Republic": Structures of Change and the Making of Kansas Populism, 1828-1896 (Supervisor: M. Kirkpatrick)
Andy Post, Newfoundland, Reeveland: Chief Justice John Reeves as Conservation Reformer, 1791-1793 (Supervisor: J. Webb)
Cynthia Power, Signing On: Literacy, Knowledge and Seafaring Work in Newfoundland, 1860-1930 (Supervisor: V. Burton)
Rebecca Smith, Uncertain Medicine and Medical Uncertainty: Ronald Ross, Medical Infrastructures and the Treatment of Malaria Amongst British Soldiers, 1914-1939 (Supervisor: J. Fantauzzo)

2018

Norma Alford, The Rough Food Mystique: The Evolution of Newfoundland Food Culture, 1945-1975 (Supervisor: T. Bishop-Stirling)
Katie Cranford, "The High Priestess of Folk": Race, Gender, and Authenticity in Greenwich Village's American Folk Music Revival Movement and the Curious Case of Odetta, 1958-1970 (Supervisor: D. Brégent-Heald)
Erin Mick, "As if she had been born actually free": Understanding Manumission, Self-Purchase, and Freedom in 19th Century Bermuda (Supervisor: N. Kennedy)
Ashley Ring, Reel Images, Real Women: Indigenous Women and Assimilation in Early Cold War Westerns (Supervisor: D. Brégent-Heald)
Jessica Steffler, Morale and (Im)morality in Wartime Newfoundland: American Servicemen's Relations with Local Newfoundland Women, 1941-1945 (Supervisor: T. Bishop-Stirling)
Mark Trainor, "Mercy we will take, and mercy we will give:" protests and justice in early nineteenth century Newfoundland (Supervisor: J. Webb)
Ally Vonk, "I Was Proud to Call Myself a Feminist": Student Second Wave Feminist Activism at Memorial University of Newfoundland, 1960-1989 (Supervisor: T. Bishop-Stirling)

2017

Syndey Burton, The Role of Vitae in the Construction of Female Identity (Supervisor: M. Cassis)
Mariah Cooper, A Female King or a Good Life and Great Mother: An Analysis of Contemporary Gendered Representations of the Empress Matilda (Supervisor: S. Rossignol)
Alexander McHenry Pietrantoni, Defeated by Tradition: Italian Neofascist Ideological Evolution, 1946-1991 (Supervisor: E. Bosák)
Norman Potter, "An Inveterate Jealousy of Strangers and So Much Perfidy": Anglo-American Perspectives of Tejano People in Mexican and Revolutionary Texas, 1821-1846 (Supervisor: D. Brégent-Heald)
Katherine Saunders, There Was No Warning: The Distant Early Warning Line and Northern Colonization, 1954-2012 (Supervisor: J. Sandlos)
Sally Western, Arsenic's Lost Years: Pollution Control at Giant Mine from 1978 to 1999 (Supervisor: J. Sandlos and A. Keeling)

2016

Jim Armour, Castles in the air: the life, times and influence of the Reverend Moses Harvey (Supervisor: S. Cadigan)
Darrell Hillier, Stars, Stripes, and Sacrifice: A Wartime Familial Experience of Hope, Loss, and Grief, and the Journey Home of an American Bomber Crew (Supervisor: M. O'Brien)
Jay McGrath, The Road to Cooperation: Fogo Island, 1967 (Supervisor: J. Webb)

2015

Edward Dodd, Engineering Men: Masculinity, the Royal Navy, and the Selborne Scheme (Supervisor: V. Burton)
Matthew King, Black, White, and Blue Collar Noir: A Study of Changing Depictions of Race Relations in Film Noir (Supervisor: D. Brégent-Heald)
Jeffry Neuhouser, Mistaken Identity: Same-Sex Attraction and Social Order in Southern Colonial America (Supervisor: N. Kennedy)
Liam O’Keefe, “Turn On, Turn Up, Drop Out”: Questioning the existence of ‘psychedelic rock’ (Supervisor: L. Fischer)
Christopher Penney, Proceedings at Variance with Practice: An examination of the interactions between Custom and Statutory Law during the final years of the Naval Gov in NL with regrets to the case of Deputy Naval Officer Peter W. Carter (Supervisor: J. Webb)
Caitlin Piercey, “This sissy would fight”: The Transsexual Community in 1960s San Francisco and the Compton’s Cafeteria Riots of 1966" (Supervisor: L. Fischer)
Nakita Ryan, A Liminal Gentleman: The Case of Admiral William Kennedy in Newfoundland (Supervisor: K. Korneski)

2014

Allison Bennett, British Refugee Policy and the Kindertransport, 1938-1945: The Evacuation of Jewish Children from the Third Reich and their Experiences in Britain (Supervisor: E. Bosák)
Marc Brouillette, Confederation as a Process and not an Event: A Case Study of the Politics of Confederation Between 1902-1919 (Supervisor: M. Humphries)
Howard Butler, The Lineup to Kill Gorbachev was too long! Anti-alcohol reform in the Soviet Union under Gorbachev (Supervisor: E. Bosák)
Margaret Connors, An Historical Register: Chinese People in Pre-Confederation Newfoundland (Supervisor: R. Sweeny)
Shannon Conway, The Transformation of English Canadian Identity, 1960-1971 (Supervisor: K. Korneski)
Matthew Field, The Influence of Experience and Operations on Mental Health in 405 Squadron (RCAF) (Supervisor: M. Humphries)
Christopher Reid, Come Follow Me: A Study of Morale, Discipline, and Effectiveness in the Newfoundland Regiment 1914-1919 (Supervisor: M. Humphries)
Aileen Worrall, Noblesse Oblige to the Empire: Class, Gentility, and the Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire in Winnipeg, 1909-1914 (Supervisor: K. Korneski)

2013

Trevor Ford, Dreaded Tempest: How the Military Intelligence Branch of the Department of Militia and Defence Conducted Intelligence Operations against One Big Union and Sinn Fein in Montréal, 1920-1921 (Supervisor: M. Humphries)
Hereward Longley, Razing Athabasca: Bitumen Extraction and the Industrial Colonization of North-Eastern Alberta, 1967-1983 (Supervisor: J. Sandlos)
Kane Master, Re-Examining Canada’s Role in the Cuban Missile Crisis: A Vindication of John G. Diefenbaker (Supervisor: K. Korneski)
Lucas Reid, “Do Your Thing”: A Comparison of Urban and Rural American Hippie Communes, 1965-1970 (Supervisor: L. Fischer)
Brianna Robertson-East, Isolated and Independent: Nurses’ life writings and Newfoundland’s rural medical history (Supervisor: T. Bishop-Stirling)
Lyndsay Rosenthal, “Upon Fertile Soil”: C.B. Farrar, Psychiatry, and the Treatment of Shell Shocked Veterans in Canada, 1917-1939 (Supervisor: M. Humphries)
Frank Sinclair, Shipowning and Investment in the Port of Sydney, Nova Scotia, 1820-1914: A Preliminary Analysis (Supervisor: L. Fischer)
Michael Westcott, Defending the Dominions: Canada, Newfoundland, and the Naval Defence of the British Empire in the First World War (Supervisor: M. Humphries)

2012

Warren Oliver Bush, Industrial Disasters at Sea Around Newfoundland & Historicizing Maritime Peril: 1914-1918 (Supervisor: S. Cadigan)
Heather Green, Life After Closure: Deindustrialized Landscape and Memories of the Polaris Mine, 1973-2012 (Supervisors: J. Sandlos & A. Keeling)
Meghan Korten, The Role of Women in Vadmál Economy in Landnám and Pjodveldi Iceland (Supervisor: L. Bryan)
Katherine MacDonald, Women, Magazine, and the War: Middle-Class Female Gender Roles Represented in Ladies’ Home Journal from 1935 to 1945 (Supervisor: L. Fischer)
Debra Spurvey, Magic Spells and Charmed Objects: Women’s Agency in Late Antiquity (Supervisor: M. Cassis)

2011

Patricia Boulter, The Survival of an Arctic Boom Town Socio-Economic and Cultural Diversity in Rankin Inlet, 1956-63 (Supervisors: J. Sandlos & A. Keeling)
Keith Collier, Clearing the Slums: The Evolution of Public Housing in St. John’s, Newfoundland, 1910-1956 (Supervisor: S. Cadigan)
Samantha Goodine, Elite Perceptions of Radicals During the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike (Supervisor: K. Korneski)
Jane Hammond, Labrador City: Gender, labour and community in a remote mining town (Supervisor: J. Sandlos)
Diana Kreuger, Six-Guns and Spaceships: The Space Western Film as Perpetuated Frontier Mythology (Supervisor: D. Brégent-Heald)
Heather Leard, The More Things Change, The More They Stay the Same: Native Employment in the Northwest Territories, Canada, as Seen through Government Reports, 1960-1990 (Supervisor: J. Sandlos)
Adam Ronan, An Island Divided: National Identity and the Confederation Debate of 1948 (Supervisor: S. Cadigan)
Julia Stryker, “To Contemplate the Species” Seafaring Stewardesses in the Atlantic Canadian Merchant Marine, 1862-1913 (Supervisor: N. Kennedy)
Meaghan Walker, Dead Men Do Tell Tales: The Inventories of British Merchant Seafarers, 1863-1879 (Supervisor: V. Burton)
Hugh Whitney, “The Count” A Biography of Allan Coats Rankin, MD (1877-1959) (Supervisor: J. Connor)

2010

Sandra Badcock, The Modern King of Camelot: An Image of John F. Kennedy through LIFE from 1953 to 1968 (Supervisor: D. Brégent-Heald)
Alexander Dezan, “The Only Course to Follow:” The Banff Springs Golf Course and Improving Nature in Banff National Park (Supervisor: J. Sandlos)
Jim Gash, The Securitzation of Disease: Kingston, Ontario and the 1918 Influenza Epidemic (Supervisor: K. Korneski)
Ben Jesseau, The Ten-Cent Apocalypse: Depictions and Portrayals of Atomic Energy in Cold War Comic Books, 1945-1962 (Supervisor: L. Fischer)
Robert Keenan, Nation Building One Division at a Time: Local Government and the Development of the Multi-Ethnic Kenyan State, 1920-1965 (Supervisor: C. Youé)
Kyle Landry, An Independent Financial State: Arthur Griffith and Sinn Féin, 1909-1912 (Supervisor: M. O’Brien)
John R. Matchim, Making Jack Tar Healthy: Medicine, Hygiene, and the Victorian Royal Navy (Supervisor: J. Connor)
Joshua Tavenor, Early Newfoundland and the Atlantic World: Imports to Newfoundland in the Late Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries (Supervisor: P. Pope)
Brent Temple, Barbarians, Infidels and Heretics: Perception of the “Other” in the Primary Sources of the Crusades (Supervisor: M. Cassis)
Kimberly Unruh, “Let them have their fun at home”: Britain, the Decline of the ‘General Settlement’ and the German Reintroduction of Conscription, 1935" (Supervisor: E. Bosák)
Linda White, The General Hospital School of Nursing St. John's, Newfoundland 1903-1930 (Supervisors: J.K. Hiller and T. Bishop-Stirling)

Ph.D Dissertations since 2010 (excluding Interdisciplinary PhD)