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Susan Gray

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SHPRS History Faculty
Associate Professor
Faculty, TEMPE Campus, Mailcode 4302
Biography: 

Susan Gray's research interests are focused on the Great Lakes Basin and more generally on the U.S.-Canadian borderlands. Her work deals with the interplay of place, race and gender, and the role of memory in the construction of identity. Gray is the author of "The Yankee West:  Community Life on the Michigan Frontier" (1996), a co-edited volume, "The American Midwest: Essays on Regional History" (2001) and a number of essays. 

Professor Gray began her career as a teacher as head of the Department of English, Happy Grove High School, Hector's River, Jamaica, after which she headed for graduate school at the University of Chicago. After receiving her doctorate, she taught first at Middlebury College before coming to Arizona State University in 1991. At ASU, Gray has taught a number of graduate and undergraduate courses in nineteenth-century U.S. history, with an emphasis on the history of women and gender. She has been involved in several curricular innovations, such as developing HST 300: Historical Inquiry, the methods course for the major in history at ASU. At the graduate level, she served as coordinator for a team-taught course in gender theory and methodology, "Representation and Lived Experience."  At present, she is the ASU coordinator for a joint ASU-York University initiative to develop a graduate seminar of the history of the U.S.-Canadian borderlands. In 2007, she taught a pilot collaborative seminar with York colleague Colin Coates. Gray is the recipient of several awards for teaching, including the 2003 Oregon-California Trails Association Educators' Award and the 2005 ASU Women Faculty Mentoring Award, and a number of nominations for other ASU prizes.

Education: 
  • Ph.D. The University of Chicago 1985
  • M.A. The University of Chicago 1980
  • A.B. Earlham College 1974
Research Interests: 

Professor Gray's research interests are focused on the Great Lakes Basin and more generally on the U.S.-Canadian borderlands.  Her work deals with the interplay of place, race and gender, and the role of memory in the construction of identity.  Gray is the author of The Yankee West:  Community Life on the Michigan Frontier (1996), a co-edited volume, The American Midwest:  Essays on Regional History (2001) and a number of essays.  At present, she is completing Lines of Descent:  Family Stories from the North Country, a multi-generational biography of a mixed-race family (Odawa, white), based on an array of personal narratives, including diaries, memoirs and oral interviews with descendants (forthcoming from the University of North Carolina Press).  She is also at work on Great Lakes Frontier:  Michigan, 1650-1920, for the Indiana University Press series on the frontier histories of the states of the trans-Appalachian West.  Her most recent publication is "Writing Michigan History from a Transborder Perspective," forthcoming in a special double issue on the Great Lakes Basin for the Michigan Historical Review.  Gray has held major fellowships from the N.E.H. and the Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History at Harvard University.  In 2000, she was a visiting professor at the John F. Kennedy Center for North American Studies at the Free University of Berlin.

Publications: 
  • Susan E. Gray and Gayle Gullett, eds. Contingent Maps: Rethinking Western Women's History and the North American West. (2014).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Interlude: Of Two Worlds and Intimate Domains". Beyond Two Worlds: Critical Conversations on Language and Power in Native North America (2014).
  • Gayle Gullett and Susan E. Gray. "Editors' Introduction". Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2012).
  • Gayle Gullett and Susan E. Gray. "Editors' Introduction". Frontiers: Journal of Women Studies (2012).
  • Susan E. Gray and Colin Coates. "Teaching History across Borders: The Collaboration between York and Arizona State Universities. Perspectives on History: The Newsmagazine of the American Historical Association (2012).
  • Susan E. Gray and Gayle Gullett. "Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2012).
  • . . Review of: Ogimaag: AnishinaabegLleadership, 1760-1845 (2012).
  • . . Review of: Winning the West with Words: Language and Conquest in the Lower Great Lakes (2012).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Migration and the Seasonal Round: An Odawa Family's Story". Migrants and Migration in Modern North America: Cross-Border Life Courses, Labor Markets, and Politics in Canada, the Caribbean, Mexico, and the United States (2011).
  • Gayle Gullett and Susan E. Gray. Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2010).
  • Susan E. Gray and Colin Coates. "Teaching History across Borders: The Collaboration between York and Arizona State Universities. Bulletin of the Canadian Historical Association (2010).
  • Susan E. Gray and Gayle Gullett. Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2010).
  • . . Review of: Their Own Frontiers: Women Intellectuals Re-visioning the American West (2010).
  • Gayle Gullett and Susan E. Gray. Editors' Forward. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2009).
  • Gayle Gullett and Susan E. Gray. Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2009).
  • Gayle Gullett and Susan E. Gray. Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2009).
  • . . Review of: Enduring Nations: Native Americans in the Midwest (2009).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Miengun's Children: Tales from a Mixed-Race Family". Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2008).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Writing Michigan History from a Transborder Perspective". Michigan Historical Review (2008).
  • Susan E. Gray and Gayle Gullett. Editors' Forward. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2008).
  • Susan E. Gray and Gayle Gullett. Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2008).
  • . Intermarriage and North American Indians. (2008).
  • Gray, Susan E, Cayton Andrew. The Identity of the American Midwest: Essays in Regional History. (2007).
  • . Domestic Colonization. (2007).
  • . . Review of: Catholic Missionaries in Rural America, 1920-1960 (2006).
  • . . Review of: Saving the Heartland: Catholic Missionaries in Rural America, 1920-1960 (2006).
  • . . Review of: The Center of a Great Empire: The Ohio Country in the Early American Republic (2006).
  • . Gender and Migration. (2006).
  • Gayle Gullett, Susan Gray. Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2005).
  • . . Review of: The Nation's Crucible: The Lousiana Purchase and the Creation of America (2005).
  • Susan Gray, Gayle Gullett. Editors' Introduction. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (2004).
  • . . Review of: American Grit: A Woman's Letters from the Ohio Frontier (2004).
  • . Gender and Place. (2004).
  • Susan Gray. North Country Stories: Written and Oral Texts of a Family History. Documentary Editing (2003).
  • . . Review of: Ohio Memory: An Online Scrapbook of Ohio History (2003).
  • . . Review of: Rethinking Home: A Case for Writing Local History, by Joseph A. Amato (2002).
  • . . Review of: Voices of American Indian Assimilation and Resistance: Helen Hunt Jackson, Sarah Winnemucca, and Victoria Howard (2002).
  • Cayton, Andrew R L, Gray, Susan E. The American Midwest: Essay in Regional History. (2001).
  • . . Review of: Battle for the Soul: Metis Children Encounter Evangelical Protestants at Mackinaw Mission, 1823-1837, by Keith Widder (2001).
  • Cayton, Andrew RL (Author) ,Gray, Susan E (Author) . The Story of the Midwest: An Introduction. The American Midwest: Essays in Regional History (2001).
  • Gray, Susan E (Author) . 'Stories Written in the Blood': Race and Midwestern History. The American Midwest: Essays on Regional History (2001).
  • Gayle Gullett and Susan E. Gray. "Editors' Introduction". Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (0).
  • Susan E. Gray and Gayle Gullett. "Editors' Introduction". Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies (0).
Research Activity: 
  • Gray,Susan E*. Borders in Globalization. UNIVERSITY OF VICTORIA(4/1/2015 - 3/31/2017).
Spring 2021
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 591Seminar
HST 599Thesis
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Fall 2020
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 599Thesis
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Spring 2020
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 599Thesis
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Fall 2019
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 599Thesis
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Spring 2019
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 130The Historian's Craft
HST 592Research
HST 599Thesis
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Fall 2018
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 494Special Topics
HST 495Methods of Historical Inquiry
HST 598Special Topics
HST 599Thesis
HST 682Advcd Rsrch Skill
HST 790Reading and Conference
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Spring 2018
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 130The Historian's Craft
HST 494Special Topics
HST 599Thesis
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Fall 2017
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 494Special Topics
HST 495Methods of Historical Inquiry
HST 590Reading and Conference
HST 591Seminar
HST 599Thesis
HST 790Reading and Conference
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Spring 2017
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 327Women in US History 1600-1880
HST 495Methods of Historical Inquiry
HST 792Research
HST 799Dissertation
Fall 2016
Course NumberCourse Title
HST 598Special Topics
HST 792Research
Presentations: 
  • Susan E. Gray. Both Sides Now: Looking North from the American Midwest". Oleson Lecture at Miami University of Ohio (Sep 2014).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Allotment, Homesteading, and the Seasonal Round: Anishinaabe Women in Northern Michigan, 1855-1887. Berkshire Conference on the History of Women (May 2014).
  • Susan E. Gray. "The Alchemy of Property: Odawa Colonies and the U.S.-Canadian Border, 1836-1862". Western History Association (Oct 2013).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Understanding and Adapting to Environmental and Economic Change: Traditional Knowledge and Water Management". American Society for Ethnohistory (Sep 2013).
  • Susan E. Gray. "The Landscape of Settlement: The Upper Great Lakes as a Case Study". National Council on Public History (Apr 2013).
  • Susan E. Gray. "What Difference Does the Border Make? Thoughts on Framing an Indigenous Borderlands Biography". Organization of American Historians (Apr 2013).
  • Susan E. Gray. Class discussion my book, The Yankee West: Community Life on the Michigan Frontier. skype participation in upper-level course on the Old Northwest, Illinois College (Mar 2013).
  • Susan E. Gray. "From Homeland to Bordered Lands? Great Lakes Geopolitics and Odawa Family History after 1815". Crossing Borders Conference, Brock University (Mar 2013).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Performing Citizenship: Andrew J. Blackbird and the Politics of Anishinaabe Persistence, 1850-1887". 33rd American Indian Workshop, Zurich, Switzerland (Apr 2012).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Anishinaabe Family History and the U.S. Canadian Border". SHPRS Faculty Forum (Oct 2011).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Border Stories Lived and Written: Francis Assikinack, Andrew J. Blackbird, and Odawa History". American Indian Workshop, Graz, Austria (Apr 2011).
  • Various. "Ethnic Identity". American Indian Workshop (Apr 2011).
  • Susan E. Gray. "TR at Tempe Normal School. ASU Public History Presentation (Mar 2011).
  • Susan E. Gray and Gayle Gullett. "Contingent Maps: Rethinking the North American West and Western Women's History. ASU Institute for Humanities Research Brown Bag Presentation (Dec 2010).
  • Susan E. Gray. Comment: "Citizens of the West: Yaqui, Ho-chunk, and Cherokee Women's Transition from Native to American, 1864-1924". Western History Association (Oct 2010).
  • Susan E. Gray, Colin Coates, Carolyn Podruchny. Roundtable: Teaching Borderlands History. Canadian Historical Association (May 2010).
  • Susan E. Gray. "One Border, Two Cousins, and the Writing of Odawa History". Canadian Historical Association (May 2010).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Gender, Region, and Culture: New Voices and Directions". Coalition for Western Women's History Roundtable, Western History Association (Oct 2009).
  • Susan E. Gray. "Required for Settlement: One Historian as Expert Witness". ASU Public History Brown Bag Presentation (Oct 2009).
  • Gray, Susan. Unnatural Allies? Historians, Genealogists, and the Writing of Family History. Meeting of the American Association for State and Local History (Sep 2007).
  • Gray, Susan. Native Peoples, the Environment, and the History of the Great Lakes State. Earth Day Conference: First, Nations, the Great Lakes, and the Environment: Tri-National Implications (Apr 2007).
  • Gray, Susan. "Native Peoples, the Environment, and the History of the Great Lakes. Canadian Studies Colloquium (Apr 2007).
  • Gray, Susan. Three Sisters: Mixed-Race Representation and Identity in the Writings of Etta S. Wilson, Jessie W. Hilton, and Stella M. Champney. Austrian Association for American Studies 2006 Conference and Canada Day (Nov 2006).
  • Gray, Susan. 'Her Cottage Mi-en-gun Walszh (Wolf's Den) in Northport': Place and Identity in a Mixed-Race Family. American Society for Ethnohistory (Nov 2005).
  • Gray, Susan. Frontiers at Thirty. Western History Association (Oct 2005).
  • Gray, Susan. Teachers without Borders: Women and the Nineteenth-Century Educational Mission across Three Continents. Berkshire Conference on the History of Women (Jun 2005).
  • Gray, Susan. Memory, Identity, and Violence: Studies in Revolutionary and Civil War America. Western Association of Women Historians (Apr 2005).
  • Gray, Susan. Pilgrims and Indians. Keynotes Compact Day Address, Arizona Society of Mayflower Descendants (Nov 2003).
  • Gray, Susan. The American Midwest: Essays on Regional History. Arizona Book Festival (Apr 2003).
  • Gray, Susan. 'Stories Written in the Blood': Race and U.S. Regional History. John F. Kennedy Institute for North American Studies (Nov 2000).
  • Gray, Susan. 'Aunt Etta Told Big Stories': Writing a Family History from Family Texts. American Historical Asociation--Pacific Coast Branch
  • Gray, Susan. Doing Local History: Advice from the Field. Graduate Seminar in Public History
  • Gray, Susan. Doing Local History: Advice from the Field. Meeting of the Sons of the American Revolution
Service: 

In the past five years, Gray's service commitments have been focused on two areas:  co-editorship of Frontiers:  A Journal of Women Studies and expert witness in a Great Lakes Indian treaty-rights case.  As part of her work for the journal and as an extension of her own research interest in scholarly editing, she has worked closely with the ASU Scholarly Publishing Program in developing an internship in journals editing and various individual editing projects for graduate and undergraduate students.  As expert witness for U.S. v. Michigan (2006), Gray produced a report, "Article 13 in the 1836 of Treaty of Washington and Land Use in the Cession, 1836 to the Present."  In addition, she is a frequent referee for various journals and publishers.  Gray's recent service at ASU has been mostly in the area of search committees—five within the last five years, including the search for departmental chair.

  • American Historical Association, Albert B. Corey Prize Committee (2015 - Present)
  • Western History Association, Co-chair search committee for a new institutional home for the Western Historical Quarterly (2014 - Present)
  • Advisory Committee, History Head, Member (2013 - Present)
  • Committee on Transdisciplinary Team-Teaching, Member (2013 - Present)
  • ASU Fulbright Committee, Member (2011 - Present)
  • Spirit of the Senses, guest speaker--"To See Ourselves as Others See Us" (2010 - Present)
  • Graduate Policy Committee, member (2010 - Present)
  • American Indian History Search Committee, member (2009 - Present)
  • American Indian History Search Committee, member (2009 - Present)
  • American Indian History Search Committee, member (2008 - Present)
  • Graduate Policy Committee, member (2008 - Present)
  • Quality of Instruction Committee, member (2008 - Present)
  • Faculty Advisory Council, North American Center for Transborder Studies, ASU, member (2008 - Present)
  • Faculty Council, North American Center for Transborder Studies, member (2008 - Present)
  • Faculty Council, North American Center for Transborder Studies, member (2008 - Present)
  • Faculty Council, North American Center for Transborder Studies, member (2008 - Present)
  • 2007 North American Qualifying Examination Committee, Chair (2007 - Present)
  • ASU-York University History Collaborative Project, Co-ordinator (2006 - Present)
  • ASU-York University History Collaborative Project, Co-ordinator (2006 - Present)
  • ASU-York University History Collaborative Project, Co-ordinator (2006 - Present)
  • CLAS Committee on Grants and Awards, Member (2006 - Present)
  • Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, co-editor (2003 - Present)
  • Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Co-Editor (2003 - Present)
  • Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Co-Editor (2003 - Present)
  • Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Co-Editor (2003 - Present)
  • Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Co-Editor (2003 - Present)
  • Journal of the Canadian Historical Association, manuscript referee (2014 - 2014)
  • Western History Association, 2015 Program Committee Member (2014 - 2014)
  • York University History Dissertation Committee--Andrew Watson, External Examiner (2014 - 2014)
  • ASU Fulbright Committee, member (2013 - 2013)
  • North American Qualifying Examination Committee, Third Reader (2013 - 2013)
  • University of Nebraska Press, manuscript referee (2013 - 2013)
  • Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Co-Editor (2003 - 2012)
  • First-year Graduate Student Review Committee, First-year portfolio evaluator (2012 - 2012)
  • Agricultural History Society, Site Committee (2009 - 2012)
  • SHPRS Awards Committee, Women's History Prize adjudicator (2012 - 2012)
  • Graduate Policy Committee, member (2010 - 2011)
  • American Indian History Search Committee, member (2009 - 2011)
  • Michigan Historical Review, manuscript referee (2010 - 2010)
  • University of Oklahoma Press, manuscript referee (2010 - 2010)
  • University of Nebraska Press, manuscript referee (2010 - 2010)
  • Native American Religions Search Committee, member (2010 - 2010)
  • Michigan State University Press, manuscript referee (2010 - 2010)
  • University of North Carolina Press, manuscript referee (2010 - 2010)
  • 2009 North American Qualifying Examination Committee, member (2009 - 2009)
  • Spirit of the Senses, guest speaker--"Stories within Stories (2009 - 2009)
  • NEH Fellowships for University Teachers, Proposal Evaluator (2009 - 2009)
  • Director of Public History Search Committee, member (2009 - 2009)
  • Director of Scholarly Publishing Search Committee, member (2008 - 2008)
  • Spirit of the Senses, guest speaker--"Reading Lewis and Clark" (2008 - 2008)
  • History Chair Search Committee, Member (2005 - 2007)
  • Journal of Historical Geography, referee (2007 - 2007)
  • University of Alberta Press, referee (2007 - 2007)
  • University of Illinois Press, referee (2007 - 2007)
  • Sons of the American Revolution, Palo Verde Chapter, invited speaker (2007)
  • Chippewa Ottawa Resource Authority, Consultant (2001 - 2006)
  • Search Committee, Director of Scholarly Publishing, Member (2006 - 2006)
  • Western History Association 2006 Program Committee, Member (2004 - 2005)
  • Fourth-Year Review Committee, Catherine Kaplan, Chair (2005 - 2005)
  • U.S. West Search Committee, Member (2003 - 2004)
  • Journal of the Early Republic, Referee (2004)
  • Phi Alpha Theta Conference, ASU, Judge (2004)
  • Scottsdale Corral of Westerners, Guest Speaker (2004 - 2004)
  • Carnegie Initiative Committee, Member (2003 - 2003)
  • NEH Fellowships for University Teachers, Evaluator (2003 - 2003)
  • Colloquium Committee, Member (2001 - 2003)
  • African American History/"Partner" Accommodation Committee, Member (2003)
  • Bedford Books of St. Martin's Press, Referee (2003)
  • Chicana History Search Committee, Chair (2003)
  • Daughters of the American Revolution Essay Contest, Judge (2003)
  • Michigan State University, External referee for promotion (2003)
  • Graduate Admissions Committee, Member (2003 - 2003)
  • Nominating Committee, Agricultural History Society, Chair (1999 - 2002)
  • Nominating Committee, Agricultural History Society, Member (1999 - 2002)
  • U.S. Field Committee, Chair (1999 - 2002)
  • Chicana History Search Committee, Member (2002 - 2002)
  • Phi Beta Kappa, Vice President (2002 - 2002)
  • Urban History Search Committee, Member (2001 - 2001)
  • Personnel Advisory Committee, Member (1999 - 2001)
  • Early U.S. Republic, African American, African Search Committees, Member (2001 - 2001)
Expertise Areas: 
History
U.S.-Canadian Relations