Dr. James B. LaGrand

Modern American Political and Social History, Urban History, Public History, Native American History

• Ph.D., U.S. History, Indiana University, 1997
• M.A., U.S. History, Indiana University, 1992
• B.A., History, Calvin College, 1990

• U.S. History, 1865-present 
• U.S. History, 1890-1945
• U.S. History, 1945-present 
• The Vietnam War
• U.S. Urban History 
• African-American History since 1865 
• Native American History 
• The American West 
• Public History 
• Nationalism and its Discontents in Modern America 
• My Country, Right or Wrong? America and its Critics
• Historical Methods (History sophomore seminar) - Fall 2014
• Historiography and the Philosophy of History (History senior seminar)
• Created and Called for Community (first-year core course)
• The Wages of Sin is Death: Breaking Bad as the New American Tragedy 

James B. LaGrand is a historian of modern America.  He teaches a wide range of courses on American history since the mid-nineteenth century, and his research and writing focuses on the intertwining of political and social history during this time.  He serves as a referee, editorial reviewer, and consultant for journals, scholarly presses, and textbooks.  Before moving to Pennsylvania to teach at Messiah College in 1997, he lived in Boston; Ottawa, Canada; Grand Rapids, Michigan; and Bloomington, Indiana.  He and his wife, Betsy, and their three children live in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania.

Selected Publications

• Indian Metropolis: Native Americans in Chicago, 1945-75.  Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 2002.  Paperback edition: 2005.
• "The Problems of Preaching through History."  In Confessing History: Explorations in Christian Faith and the Historian's Vocation, edited by John Fea, Jay Green, and Eric Miller. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2010.  pp. 187-213.
• "Indian Work and Indian Neighborhoods: Adjusting to Life in Chicago during the 1950s."  In Enduring Nations: Native Americans in the Midwest, edited by R. David Edmunds.  Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 2008. 
• "Urban Indians in the U.S. and Indian Identity: An Examination of Chicago from the 1940s through the 1970s."  In Not Strangers In These Parts: Urban Aboriginal Peoples, edited by David Newhouse and Evelyn Peters.  Ottawa: Policy Research Initiative, 2003.  Translated and published in French as "L'identité amérindienne urbaine dans une grande ville des États-Unis: Le Cas de Chicago des Années 1950 aux années 1970."  In Des Gens D'ici: Les Autochtones en Milieu Urbain.
• "Whose Voices Count? Oral Sources and Twentieth-Century American Indian History."  American Indian Culture and Research Journal 21:1 (Winter 1997): 73-105.
• "The Changing 'Jesus Road': Protestants Reappraise American Indian Missions in the 1920s and 1930s."  Western Historical Quarterly 27 (Winter 1996): 479-504.
• "Bob Dylan's Benediction for Today's Graduates," The Federalist (May 19, 2014)
• "Fifty Years Later, We're Still Fighting the War on Poverty," Harrisburg Patriot-News (January 10, 2014)
• "Breaking Bad for Christians: A Morally Ordered Show," Patheos (October 15, 2012)
• "Reconsidering 'The Wizard of Tuskegee,'" First Principles (September 9, 2009)

Selected Presentations

• "Martin Luther King's 'Letter from Birmingham Jail' Across the Generations," Association for Core Texts and Courses (ACTC) annual conference, Ottawa, Canada, April 2013.
• "Is there a Place for the Nation in Modern American History?" Calvin College History Department Colloquia Series, March 2012.
• "The Promise and Problems of Progressivism in Industrial America," Center for Vision and Values Lecture Series, Grove City College, March 2012.
• "Protestant-Inspired Reform in the City: The Search for Solidarity and Connection," Conference on Faith and History biennial meeting, George Fox University, October 2010.
• "The West in American Life, Culture, and Politics," State Department Summer Institute for University Teachers, Grantham PA, July 2007.
• "The Beginnings of Chicago's American Indian Community," Conference on Illinois History annual meeting, October 2005.