Professor Kimberly D. Schmidt is the 2022 speaker for the Albert N. Keim Lecture Series, sponsored by 91短视频’s history and political science programs. She speaks Monday, March 21, at 5 p.m. in Swartzendruber Hall, Room 106, in the Suter Science Center. A light reception precedes the event at 4:30 p.m.
The event is free and open to the public. Masks are optional. The event will be livestreamed on .
Schmidt’s topic is “Marketing Mennonites, Posing Cheyennes: Photography, Gender, and Indigenous Agency on the Mission Field (1880-1920).” She will share an extensive collection of stunning photographs taken of Cheyenne people by Mennonite missionaries. The collection reveals troubling intersectionalities of gender constructions, forced acculturation, religion, and U.S. policy on the Cheyenne Mennonite missions at the turn of the twentieth century.
Schmidt is the former director of 91短视频鈥檚 , a position she held for 23 years. She continues to serve 91短视频 as an affiliate professor of gender history. Schmidt earned a PhD in American history from Binghamton University in 1995.
Schmidt’s novel (New Mexico State University Press, 2016) was a Women Writing the West WILLA Literary Awards Finalist, historical fiction category. She has also published (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003).
Walks at Dawn Speaks, a second work of historical fiction, centers on Monahsetah, also known as Meotzi, a young woman claimed by both the Southern and Northern Cheyenne nations. Monahsetah became Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custers鈥� mistress, guide, peace envoy and cultural bridge builder during the Plains Indian Wars. Southern Cheyenne cultural interpreters are currently reviewing the manuscript.聽
Schmidt’s fourth book project focuses on Bertha Kinsinger Petter, a Mennonite missionary to both Southern and Northern Cheyennes from 1896-1963, and how Mennonite constructions of gender and women鈥檚 work on the mission supported U.S. government assimilationist and cultural annihilation policies.
She is preparing to lead A Women鈥檚 West: Exploring Native American Women鈥檚 History and Culture, a three-week 91短视频 intercultural tour of the American Southwest, this summer.
More on the Keim Lecture Series
The Albert N. Keim Lecture Series honors the memory of Professor Albert N. Keim who served as a history professor here for 35 years and was the academic dean from 1977 to 1984.
Learn more about past presenters, in this sampling:
2021: 聽Historian, author, and investigative reporter聽Rick Shenkman, founder of History News Network, spoke on 鈥�Why is Democracy so @#$&! Hard?鈥澛�
2020: 笔谤辞蹿别蝉蝉辞谤听Ernesto Verdeja, of the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at University of Notre Dame, was the speaker.聽
2019: Federal public defender, immigrant rights attorney and playwright Kara Hartzler 鈥�94 spoke on 鈥淏orders, Jails, and Long Drives in the Desert: 25 Years of Immigration Law in the Southwest.鈥�
2017: Dongping Han, professor at Warren-Wilson College and a native of rural China, addressed 鈥淭he Cultural Revolution: A Reinterpretation from Today鈥檚 China.鈥�
2016: Artist/activist provided a lecture titled 鈥�Performing Statistics: Connecting incarcerated youth, artists, and leading policy experts to challenge Virginia鈥檚 juvenile justice system.鈥�
2015: , political scientist in the University of Kansas鈥檚 School of Public Affairs and Administration, presented 鈥淭he Police and Racial Discrimination in America.鈥�
2014: , a pastor, activist and history professor who helped EMC professors initiate social change in Harrisonburg during the early 1960s, presented 鈥淚s America Possible?鈥�