Dr. James W. Feldman

Education

University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin. Ph.D. in American History, 2004.

Dissertation: “Rewilding the Islands: Nature, History, and Policy at Apostle Islands National Lakeshore”; co-directed by William Cronon and Nancy Langston.

Teaching fields: 20^th century U.S., American West, and Environmental History.

Minor field: Environmental Policy Studies.

Utah State University, Logan, Utah, M.A. in History, 1996.

Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts, B.A. in History, 1993, cum laude.

Employment & Teaching Experience

Assistant Professor, Departments of History and Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, Autumn 2004-present. Courses: American Environmental History; Global Environmental History; History of American Wilderness; Consumerism and Nature in Twentieth Century America; Wisconsin Environments Past and Present; Introduction to Environmental Studies: Seminar on Environmental Issues; Environment & Society; Topics in Campus Sustainability.

Adjunct Professor, Department of History, University of Wisconsin Stevens Point, Autumn 2003, teaching American Environmental History.

Lecturer, University of Wisconsin Madison, Spring 2001, Autumn 2002. Courses: American Environmental History; Environmental Studies: The Humanistic Perspective.

Teaching Assistant, University of Wisconsin Madison, in the department of history, teaching survey and upper-level courses in American History, January 1999-December 2000.

Diversity Recruitment and Retention Coordinator, Dept. of History, University of Wisconsin, January-August 2002: Coordinated efforts to recruit and retain students in the history graduate program, with particular attention to attracting a diverse group of students. 

Researcher, Division of Public History, Wisconsin Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin, 2001-2002: conducted photographic and historical research for book, pamphlet, and article publications.

Review Editor, Wisconsin Magazine of History, Wisconsin Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin, 1999-2001: solicited, edited, and prepared book reviews for publication in a scholarly journal.

Commissioned Researcher, Waitangi Tribunal, Wellington, New Zealand, 1997-1998: conducted research for the New Zealand government on the conservation history and traditional use of flora and fauna by Maori.

Research Associate, Northland Project, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand, 1996-1997: conducted research on the history of introduced species for the Northland Project, a government-funded investigation of sustainable development in Northland, New Zealand.

Editorial Fellow, Western Historical Quarterly, Logan, Utah, 1994-1996: edited and prepared articles and reviews for publication in a scholarly history journal.

                                                     Publications: Articles & Books

Feldman, James, A Storied Wilderness: Nature, History, and the Rewilding of Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, under contract with University of Washington Press, expected publication in 2010.

Feldman, James, “State Power, Consumer Society, and the Spontaneous Rewilding of the Apostle Islands” in Marc Hall, ed., Restoria: The Presence of the Past in Ecological Restoration, submitted to Routledge Press, 2007.

Feldman, James, and Lynne Heasely, “Recentering North American Environmental History: Pedagogy and Scholarship in the Great Lakes Region,”Environmental History 12 (October 2007): 951-58.

Feldman, James, “The Leopold Report, Public Opinion, and the Reform of Federal Predator Control Policy,” Human-Wildlife Conflicts 1 (Spring 2007): 12-24.

Feldman, James, “The View from Sand Island: Reconsidering the Peripheral Economy,” Western Historical Quarterly 35 (Autumn 2004): 284-307.

Feldman, James, and Robert Mackreth, “Wasteland, Wilderness, or Workplace? Perceiving and Preserving the Apostle Islands” in Protecting Our Diverse Heritage: The Role of Parks, Protected Areas, and Cultural Sites, Proceedings of the George Wright Society/National Park Service Joint Conference, ed. D. Harmon, B. M. Kilgore, and G. E. Vietzke (Hancock, MI: George Wright Society, 2004)

Feldman, James, Treaty Rights and Pigeon Poaching: Alienation of Maori Access to Kereru, 1864-1960 (Waitangi Tribunal, Wellington, New Zealand, 2001).

Feldman, James, “What Do You Do Out Here?: The Past and Present at Raspberry Island Light,” Wisconsin Magazine of History 84 (Summer 2001): 2-15.

Publications: Reviews and Encyclopedia Articles

Feldman, James, review of American Wilderness: A New History, ed. Michael Lewis, Environmental History 13 (July 2008): 576-77.

Feldman, James, review of Sustainability or Collapse? An Integrated History and Future of People on Earth, ed. Robert Costanza, Lisa J. Graumlich, and Will Steffen, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 39 (Autumn 2008): 245-46.

Feldman, James, review of Drawing Lines in the Forest: Creating Wilderness Areas in the Pacific Northwest, by Kevin R. Marsh, Pacific Historical Review 77 (no. 4): 677-78.

Feldman, James, review of The Environmental Justice Reader: Politics, Poetics, Pedagogy, ed. Joni Adamson, Mei Mei Evans, and Rachel Stein, Nevada Historical Society Quarterly 50 (Winter 2007): 367-68.

Feldman, James, review of Conservation of the Black-Tailed Prairie Dog, ed. John L. Hoogland, Journal of the West 46 (Summer 2007): 85.

Feldman, James, review of Oneida Lives: Long-Lost Voices of the Wisconsin Oneidas, ed. Herbert S. Lewis, Journal of the West.45 (Spring 2006): 91-92.

Feldman, James, review of Planning a Wilderness: Regenerating the Great Lakes Cutover Region, by James Kates, Wisconsin Magazine of History 86 (Summer 2003): 59.

Feldman, James, review of Fire in the Sierra Nevada, by George E. Gruell, Environmental History 8 (January 2003).

Feldman, James, “The Fair Deal,” and “Elections, 1946-1968,” in Encyclopedia of American History, ed. Allan Winkler (New York: Facts on File, Inc., 2003).

Feldman, James, “J. I. Rodale,” in Encyclopedia of World Environmental History, ed. Shepard Krech III, John R. McNeill, Carolyn Merchant, (New York: Routlege Press, 2003).

Feldman, James, review of Indian Country, God’s Country: Native Americans and the National Parks, by Philip Burnham, Western Historical Quarterly 33 (Spring 2002).

Feldman, James, review of The Essential Aldo Leopold: Quotations and Commentaries, ed. Curt Meine and Richard L. Knight, Western Historical Quarterly 32 (Spring 2001).

Feldman, James, review of The Hunter’s Game: Poachers and Conservationists in Twentieth-Century America, by Louis Warren, Western Historical Quarterly 29 (Winter 1998).

Feldman, James, review of The Great American Wolf, by Bruce Hampton, Environmental History 3 (January 1998).

Feldman, James, “The Pony Express,” in The Oxford Companion to United States History, ed. Paul Boyer (Oxford University Press, New York, 2001).

                                                           Fellowships and Awards

Faculty Development Grant, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, 2007 and 2008, for research on the environmental history of the Apostle Islands.

Faculty Development Grant, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, 2005, for research on treaty rights and nature protection in postwar American history.

Theodore C. Blegen Prize, 2006, Forest History Society, for best article in forest and conservation history published in a journal other than Environmental History, for “The View from Sand Island.”

Canadian Studies Faculty Enrichment Grant, Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, 2005, for research and classroom preparation in North American Great Lakes environmental history.

Baench Prize in Wisconsin History, 2005, History Department, University of Wisconsin Madison.

Bert M. Fireman Prize, 2004, for the best student essay in the Western Historical Quarterly, Volume 35, for the article “The View from Sand Island: Reconsidering the Peripheral Economy, 1880-1940.”

Fulbright Scholarship, 1996-1998, to study environmental history and politics in New Zealand.

Kathlyn Gibson History Dissertator Fellowship, Department of History, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Spring 2004.

Vilas Travel Fellowship, Graduate Student Council, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Fall 2002 and Fall 2003, for a paper presentations at the American Society for Environmental History Conference in Victoria, Canada, March 2004 and the George Wright Society Conference in San Diego, CA, April 2003.

WARF University Fellowship, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1998-1999, for graduate study.

Robert M. Utley Fellowship, Utah State University, 1994-1996: presented by the Western History Association for graduate study in history of the American West.

W. Mont Timmins Prize, 1995, for the best essay on the history of Cache Valley, Utah, for the essay “What is Wilderness? Howling at the Moon: The Mount Naomi Coyote Hunting Controversy.”

Conference Presentations/Public History

Cultivating Sustainable Agriculture: Higher Education Programs in Wisconsin, Madison, WI, October 2008, “How Food Service is Organized on the UW-O Campus and the Ramification for Procuring Local.”

American Society for Environmental History Annual Conference, Boise, Idaho, March 2008, ‘Tradeoffs and Compromises: Environmental Historians in Environmental Studies Programs.”

Social Science History Association Annual Conference, Chicago, IL, November 2007, “Production, Consumption, and State Power in Wisconsin, 1880-1970.”

Lecture, Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, August 2007, “A Storied Wilderness: Nature, History, and the Rewilding of the Apostle Islands.”

Social Science History Association Annual Conference, Minneapolis Minnesota, November 2006, “Rights over Access: Outdoor Recreation, Nature Protection and Treaty Rights in the Creation of Apostle Islands National Lakeshore.”

Restoring or Renaturing? The Presence of the Past in Ecological Restoration—A Transatlantic Workshop, Zurich, Switzerland, July 2006, “Before Rewilding: State Power and the Transition from Production to Consumption in the Apostle Islands.”

American Society for Environmental History Annual Conference, St. Paul, Minnesota, March 2006, with Lynne Heasely, “Recentering the ‘American Environmental History’ survey: A Great Lakes and Canadian Studies Approach from Two Campuses.”

Teacher’s Academy for the Study of American History, Oshkosh, WI, February 2006, “Treaty Rights, Civil Rights, Nature, and History in Wisconsin.”

American Society for Environmental History Annual Conference, Houston, Texas, March 2005, chair and respondent for the panel “Ideology and Recreational Environments.”

American Society for Environmental History Annual Conference, Victoria, British Columbia, March 2004, “Nature Tourism and the Imposition of the Federal Landscape of Wilderness.”

George Wright Society Biennial Conference, San Diego, CA, April 2003, co-authored with Robert Mackreth, “Wasteland, Wilderness, or Workplace? Perceiving and Preserving the Apostle Islands”; Conference title: “Protecting our Diverse Heritage: The Role of Parks, Protected Areas, and Cultural Sites”

American Society for Environmental History Annual Conference, Providence, RI, March 2003, “Beyond the Wilderness Boundary: Nature and History at Apostle Islands National Lakeshore.”

UW Madison Environmental History Colloquium, Madison, WI, “Beyond the Wilderness Boundary: Designating Wilderness at Apostle Islands National Lakeshore.”  

Great Lakes History Conference, Paper presentation, October 2002, Grand Rapids, MI: “Booster Dreams and Environmental Realities on the Lake Superior Shore.”

Lecture, Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, July 2002: “A Vision for the Apostles:  Nature and History at Apostle Islands National Lakeshore.”

Forest History Center, Grand Rapids, MN, July 2002: Comprehensive Interpretive Planning Session, consulting advisor helping to rework the mission and interpretive themes of the center.

Wisconsin Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, June 2001: facilitator for NPS/Wisc. Historical Society-sponsored workshop for a local network commemorating the U.G.R.R. in WI.

University of Auckland, New Zealand, December, 1996: “A Plague of Possums: Environmental History of a Pest Species in New Zealand,’ Geography Department lecture series.

Selected Professional Service