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Michael C. Fisher

PhD Candidate, ABD

Field: American History

Major Fields: Modernism and Modernity, 19th Century European Intellectual History

Minor Fields: Recent American History, American Cultural and Intellectual History

Research Interests: I am interested primarily in American cultural and intellectual history, particularly since 1945. This interest has led me to a broader concern with the meaning and impact of modernity in Western culture, and to the history of European thought since 1800.

Adviser: Joan Shelley Rubin

Dissertation:

Education:
BA, History, UC Davis, 2006

Contact Info

mcfisher84@yahoo.com

Publications/Presentations:

  • “The Road From Modernity: The Two Paths of James and Nietzsche.”  Exchanges and Returns: The Crossroads of Interaction Graduate Conference, Syracuse University, March 2012.
  • “Fully-Licensed Subjectivity and the End of Modernity.” Image, Truth, and Distortion Graduate Conference, University of Rochester, February 2012.
  • Paul Goodman Changed My Life panel participant. Dryden Theater, Rochester, New York, February 2012.
  • “The (Moral) Problem of Modernity.” Humanities Caucus panel, University of Rochester, January 2012.
    Paul Goodman Changed My Life panel participant. United States Intellectual History Conference, City University of New York, November 2011.
  • "The Coming of the Modern: How Tocqueville and Kierkegaard Envisioned the Ethos of their Age." Second-Year Conference, University of Rochester, April 2010.
  • "A 'Religious Crisis': Paul Goodman and the Necessary New Reformation." The Great Rehearsal? World Revolutions of 1968 Conference, University of San Francisco, September 2008.
  • Introduction to the new edition of New Reformation: Notes of A Neolithic Conservative by Paul Goodman (Oakland: PM Press, 2010).
  • “Goods Aplenty: Against Thrift and the Question, ‘What for?’” The Blog of the Society for U.S. Intellectual History, 3/22/12
  • Co-author with Jonathan Lee, Paul Goodman Changed My Life study guide (Zeitgeist Films, 2012).

Teaching Experience:

  • WRT 105: The Individual and American Culture, Instructor, University of Rochester, Fall 2010 and Spring 2011
  • HIS 148: Recent America, 1945-1989, Teaching Assistant for Dr. Robert Westbrook, University of Rochester, Spring 2010
  • HIS 147: Industrial America, 1865-1929, Teaching Assistant for Dr. Daniel Borus, University of Rochester, Fall 2009

Honors:

  • 2012 David A. Parker Memorial Prize, “to the graduate student in the PhD program who best exemplifies David Parker’s qualities of historical imagination and dedication to learning.”
  • 2011 Lina and A. William Salomone Prize, for “outstanding work in European cultural and intellectual history”
  • 2010 Wilson Coates Book Prize, for Second Year Paper “The Coming of the Modern: How Tocqueville and Kierkegaard Envisioned the Ethos of their Age”
  • 2006 High Honors, for Honors Thesis in History, “Paul Goodman: a ‘Neolithic Conservative’ in Search of Social Revolution,” UC Davis