Paul Kuenker, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of History
Areas of expertise
- 19th Century United States
- American Cultural History
- Technology, modernity, and danger
- American visual culture
- Space, place, and landscape studies
Education
- Ph.D., History, Arizona State University, 2016
- M.A., History, Arizona State University, 2013
- B.A., History and Art History, The College of William and Mary, 2008
About Dr. Kuenker
This past fall semester, Dr. Kuenker taught his "Technology and American Modernity" course for the first time in a couple of years. Students traveled on the Durango and Silverton Railroad, explored 19th-century cameras and stereoscopic imagery housed at the Center of Southwest Studies, and even blacked out Dr. Kuenker's office windows with aluminum foil (with one tiny hole opened in it) to create a walk-in camera obscura that projected an upside-down image from outside onto the opposite wall. Students studied historical technologies in context and considered their various expected and unexpected effects on society.
Dr. Kuenker also continues his research in this area. His article, " 'How Shall We Save Ourselves': Transportation Disasters and the Rights of the Traveling Public in the Age of Steam," will be published in the forthcoming volume of the Massachusetts Historical Review, and Dr. Kuenker will be working to submit his related book manuscript to publishers this spring.
Dr. Kuenker's office windows covered. No, this photo is not upside down; it is actually the projected image!
Photo: Fort Lewis College Photo: Fort Lewis College