Laura Mitchell
Laura J. Mitchell is Associate Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. A specialist in African and world history, her scholarship examines colonial South Africa, Dutch East India Company networks, and environmental and social histories of land, labor, and family. She writes and teaches history with comparative perspectives.
University of California, Irvine
Session
What does it mean to write and teach world history in the 21st century? This plenary session brings together historians whose work spans Africa, Asia, the Indian Ocean world, and China in a global context, this plenary examines the methodological and pedagogical challenges of narrating the past beyond the nation-state. Drawing on their diverse regional and thematic expertise, the panelists will discuss how historians balance what analytical scales best illuminate historical connections and how global history can be taught and written about in ways that remain both rigorous and accessible in an era of renewed nationalist storytelling.