Public History at Suffolk
Suffolk University students have many opportunities to “do history” on and off campus!
Whether designing walking tours, digging into archival collections on campus, building digital projects on the web, or marketing a finished project, Professor Lasdow’s classes teach students the skills they need to succeed in the history profession and its many related fields.
Professor Lasdow is the Faculty Director and founder of the Summer Public History Institute, a 2-week immersive program for high school students in grades 10-12.
Undergraduate Student Work
Public History Honors THESIS Projects
History Major Lucy Pollock (‘21) worked with Professor Lasdow on a Public History honors thesis to research, design, and build the digital exhibition Vanguard: Boston in the 1918 Influenza Pandemic. Lucy’s work was featured in an installation on view in Sawyer Library in 2021-2022.
History Major Collin Smith (‘22) worked with Professor Lasdow on the research and script development for an original play “The People of the Peoples Temple,” which reexamined the Jonestown Massacre from the perspective of the Black, white, and young adults enmeshed in the radical community. His work later premiered as a staged production with the Suffolk University Theatre Department.
History Major Ainslee Moorehead (‘22) worked with Professor Lasdow on a Public History honors thesis to craft a policy paper for Boston-area historic sites focused on popular protest and the American Revolution. Her thesis offered recommendations on how to adapt curatorial and educational approaches to connect the history of Revolutionary-era protest to the Black Lives Matter protests of the 21st century.
Undergraduate student work
PUBLIC HISTORY CLASS PROJECTS
NARRATING THE PAST THROUGH DIGITAL STORY telling
Students in Prof. Lasdow’s Digital History courses partner with the Suffolk University Moakley Archive and Institute to explore historical documents, oral histories, photographs, and other University collections to create interactive projects about their school and their city’s diverse and vibrant past. Previous course projects have included: websites, podcasts, ArcGIS StoryMaps, and a born-digital archive of life during the Covid-19 pandemic.
A Journal of a Plague Year:
Covid-19 Digital Archive
Students in Professor Lasdow’s Fall 2020 Digital History course created “Covid Mini Collections” to add to the University’s Covid-19 digital archive. They conducted oral history interviews; collected objects, artifacts, and photos; and contributed written and born-digital materials.
Collections documented such topics as:
The Experiences of Essential Workers in Hospitals, Grocery Stores, and Schools
Pregnancy, Parenting, and Childcare During Lockdown
Sexuality and Relationships for College Students and Young Adults
Road Tripping Through the Fall Semester and Visiting National Parks
The Undergraduate Experience in the Pandemic
Explore their collections using the hashtags #HST241, #CovidMiniCollection, #Suffolk.