Faculty Profile

Christopher Bilodeau

Associate Professor of History (2006)

Contact Information

bilodeac@dickinson.edu

Denny Hall Room 207
717-245-1385

Bio

He focuses his research on the history of American Indian-European interaction during the American colonial period, paying particular attention to the French, English, and Indian interaction. He teaches courses on Colonial America, the American Revolution, American Indian History, and the roles that violence plays in colonial situations.

Education

  • B.A., University of Vermont, 1991
  • M.A., Brown University, 1994
  • M.A., Columbia University, 1998
  • Ph.D., Cornell University, 2006

2024-2025 Academic Year

Fall 2024

FYSM 100 First-Year Seminar
The First-Year Seminar (FYS) introduces students to Dickinson as a "community of inquiry" by developing habits of mind essential to liberal learning. Through the study of a compelling issue or broad topic chosen by their faculty member, students will: - Critically analyze information and ideas - Examine issues from multiple perspectives - Discuss, debate and defend ideas, including one's own views, with clarity and reason - Develop discernment, facility and ethical responsibility in using information, and - Create clear academic writing The small group seminar format of this course promotes discussion and interaction among students and their professor. In addition, the professor serves as students' initial academic advisor. This course does not duplicate in content any other course in the curriculum and may not be used to fulfill any other graduation requirement.

HIST 117 American Hist 1607 to 1877
This course covers colonial, revolutionary, and national America through Reconstruction. Include attention to historical interpretation. Multiple sections offered.

ANTH 205 Native Peoples of E North Am
Cross-listed with HIST 389-01. A survey of major development among Native Americans east of the Mississippi River from approximately A.D. 1500 to the present, using the interdisciplinary methodologies of ethnohistory. Topics to be addressed include 16th and 17th century demographic, economic, and social consequences of contact with European peoples, 18th century strategies of resistance and accommodation, 19th century government removal and cultural assimilation policies, and 20th century cultural and political developments among the regions surviving Indian communities.

HIST 389 Native Peoples of E North Am
Cross-listed with ANTH 205-01.

HIST 500 Studies in Native Peoples, 18t

Spring 2025

HIST 247 Early American History
An examination of North American history from the earliest contacts between European and American peoples to the eve of the American Revolution. Particular attention is devoted to the interplay of Indian, French, Spanish, and English cultures, to the rise of the British to a position of dominance by 1763, and to the internal social and political development of the Anglo-American colonies.

HIST 311 Violence and Colonialism
This course will place, in a comparative perspective, the key role of violence in European colonization of numerous parts of the world. Three geographical locations will be analyzed (North America, South America, and Africa) and four imperial powers (English, French, Spanish and German) over the period of the 16th through 20th centuries. The goal is not a comprehensive look at the roles of violence in colonialism, but an episodic analysis of the ways in which violence manifests itself in colonial situations across time and space. Topics will include (among others) theories of violence, the origins of colonial violence, the roles of violence in colonizing versus colonized societies, overt resistance to colonial domination, and the power and persistence of symbolic violence.