Karen Benjamin, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of History

Social Science Education Coordinator

Email: benjamin@sxu.edu

Areas of Specialization

U.S. History; U.S. South; Race; Education

The past is never dead. It’s not even past.

-William Faulkner

Karen Benjamin is an assistant professor of history and the coordinator of the social science education program at Saint Xavier University. She graduated with a Ph.D. in History and in Educational Policy Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the spring of 2007. Her research and teaching interests include twentieth-century U.S. history, the historical construction of race, the history of American education, and the history of the U.S. South. She received a National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2010 to begin work on her current book project, Segregation Built to Last: School Construction and the Formation of Segregated Housing Patterns in the Interwar South.

Her research analyzes the relationship between the school construction boom of the 1920s and the development of residential segregation in southern cities, with a focus on Atlanta, Houston, and Raleigh.  She argues that during the early twentieth century, southern school boards played a key role in creating residential segregation in what was once a region with significantly integrated housing patterns. This research project developed from a case study of a 1920s school building program in Raleigh, North Carolina, which continues to influence residential patterns in that city.  Her recent article on this topic appeared in a special issue of the Journal of Urban History (Spring 2012) that examines the broader connections between schooling and suburbanization in the United States.

Courses Offered

HIST 103 - U.S. History to 1877
HIST 104 - U.S. History since 1877
HIST 395 - Senior Seminar
HIST 250 - Southern Slavery; Southern Freedom

HIST 250 - Special Topics: Ghetto Formation in Twentieth-Century Chicago (Community-Based Learning Course)

HIST 361 - U.S. Urban and Suburban History

SOCSC 203 - Social Scientific Thinking

FYS 175 - We Are What We Buy: Consumers, Suburbs, and the American Dream (First Year Seminar)

Selected Publications

“Suburbanizing Jim Crow: The Impact of School Policy on Residential Segregation in Raleigh" Journal of Urban History 30, no. 2 (March 2012): 225-246.

“Progressivism Meets Jim Crow: Curriculum Revision and Development in Houston, Texas, 1924-1929,” Paedagogica Historica 39 (August 2003): 457-476.

"The Decision to Teach: The Challenges and Opportunities of a One-Room Schoolteacher in Turn-of-the-Century Texas," Thresholds in Education 26, nos. 1&2 (2001): 18-30.

Selected Honors

Community-Based Learning Course Development Grant, Saint Xavier University, 2012

National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship, 2010-2011

Nominated for the Saint Xavier University's Excellence in Teaching Award, 2009

University Dissertator Fellowship, University of Wisconsin Graduate School, 2005-2006

Matthew H. Willing Award for the most outstanding dissertation in progress, Department of Educational Policy Studies, University of Wisconsin, 2006

Spencer Dissertation Fellowship for Research Related to Education, 2004-2005

Graduate Student Paper Award, Division F, History and Historiography, American Educational Research Association Annual Meeting, 2004

Plan 2008 Award of Excellence, University of Wisconsin, 2004

Recognized for an outstanding contribution to the improvement of campus climate through the co-creation of Student SEED (Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity)

John R. Palmer Graduate Fellowship, University of Wisconsin, School of Education, 2004

Arvil S. Barr Graduate Fellowship, University of Wisconsin, School of Education, 2003-2004

Sterling Fishman Memorial Scholarship, Department of Educational Policy Studies, University of Wisconsin, 2002

Spencer Foundation Academic Fellowship, University of Wisconsin, School of Education,2001-2003