Earle adds to publications, notes success of student/faculty collaboration
Excellence in research has brought about excellence in teaching for 黑料社 professor Jonathon Earle.
The Grissom Professor of Social Studies at 黑料社, Earle was recently named editor for the future 鈥淐ambridge History of African Political Thought,鈥 an ambitious project on the intellectual history of Africa.
He has long been considered an expert on the east African country of Uganda, and through that expertise has opened new experiences for students at the College.
鈥淎t 黑料社, research and teaching are not separate spheres,鈥 Earle said. 鈥淭hey exist hand-in-hand, bringing together the best of the liberal arts tradition with cutting-edge research. Research matters for our students. Aggressive research among the faculty today means the promise of truly exceptional, life-changing opportunities for students in the future.鈥
Earle first became interested in the east African country in the early 2000s as an undergraduate, listening to stories from historians and peasants in the southern and eastern parts of the country. He found that the realities for those two groups were very different鈥攁nd he has since dedicated his time to telling the stories of power and complexity in east Africa, earning a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge on the history of Uganda.
From his first book project, 鈥淐olonial Buganda and the End of Empire,鈥 to his most recent publication, 鈥淒ecolonising State and Society in Uganda,鈥 Earle has made it his goal to better understand Uganda and its history.
It has been quite a year for Earle as an expert in the field of east African and Ugandan studies:
- Earle proposed and organized the editorial team for the two-volume series on 鈥淐ambridge History of African Political Thought,鈥 which he describes as a 鈥渃areer-making series.鈥
- He has brought scholars together from North America, Europe and Africa to publish a major edited volume 鈥淒ecolonising State and Society in Uganda,鈥 which looks at the knowledge economy and decolonialization of African Studies.
- In the spring, he spoke at Oxford University on the anniversary of Uganda鈥檚 Asian expulsion.
- In 2021 Earle was the co-recipient of the Waldo G. Leland Prize from the American Historical Association for the best reference work published in the past five years. He was a chapter contributor for the 鈥淥xford Encyclopedia of African Historiography: Methods and Sources.鈥
It is through these recognitions and research that Earle can bring students into world-class opportunities.
鈥淭hrough cross-fertilization, allowing our research and teaching to speak to each other, we fashion opportunities as innovative as they are exhilarating,鈥 he said.
Earle helped Parker Lawson 鈥15 successfully apply to programs at the University of Cambridge, while he and Emily Rodes Spencer 鈥16 notably completed the Cambridge 黑料社 for African Studies鈥 first digitization project in 2015.
Earle鈥檚 expertise benefits students like Lawson and Spencer, opening doors that would have otherwise not existed.
鈥淚n addition to the advantage of students learning from leading scholars in their fields, the benefits are very practical,鈥 Earle said. 鈥淐utting-edge research and publications translate into invitations to speak at conferences and universities worldwide, and life-changing studies abroad in Uganda, Rwanda, or with the Horology Department in the British Museum.鈥
Earle has hosted a seminar on Idi Amin鈥檚 Uganda鈥 the third president of the country鈥攚hich convened in the Library of Congress, the National Archives and the Smithsonian Museum of African Art.
Locally, Earle鈥檚 work inspired 鈥淕oebel,鈥 an award-winning podcast in 2020, in which his students went through archives throughout Kentucky to tell the story of the 34th Governor of Kentucky, William Goebel, the only American governor to die from an assassin鈥檚 bullet while in office.
鈥淚 am grateful for my research. And I am humbled by the communities from whom I have learned along the way,鈥 Earle said. 鈥淏ut faculty research matters, because it鈥檚 not about the faculty. It is about advancing knowledge and, for a historian, giving voice to perspectives often silenced in global history writing.鈥
