The Department of History at Lehigh University seeks to hire a distinguished scholar as the inaugural Lawrence Henry Gipson Chair in Transnational History. This will be a tenured appointment with highly competitive compensation and research funding at the rank of Professor or advanced Associate Professor. A PhD in History or a related field is required. The successful candidate will also be able to draw on experience advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion, which are central components of Lehigh’s academic excellence. The Department encourages applications from scholars of transnational history (broadly defined) working in all geographical areas and time periods. It welcomes historians with interdisciplinary approaches and international backgrounds.
The Department features a small, excellent graduate program focused on transnational history that offers both the M.A. and Ph.D. degrees. The successful candidate will play a leading role in strengthening the Department’s profile in research, scholarship, and graduate studies, while also furthering the Department’s tradition of excellence in both undergraduate teaching and service to the University and the profession. The successful candidate will bolster existing strengths or contribute to new areas of distinction in the Department.
The scholar after whom the Chair is named, Lawrence Henry Gipson, was a Pulitzer and Bancroft Prize-winning historian who wrote and taught at Lehigh from 1924 until his death in 1971. Lehigh is a distinguished research university with a $2.1 billion endowment. It offers a distinctive educational environment for its 5,200 undergraduate and 1,900 graduate students from around the globe. Located on a scenic, 1,600-acre campus in the vibrant and historic city of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, the University is about one and a half hours from downtown New York City and an hour from Philadelphia. The Lehigh Valley, home to 860,000 people, is an attractive place to live and work with a reasonable cost of living, good schools, and abundant cultural activities.
The University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer with a strong commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. In 2020 Lehigh was named one of “Best of the Best LGBTQ-Friendly Colleges & Universities” by Campus Pride, and in 2019 Lehigh received the Higher Education Excellence in Diversity Award from the magazine Insight into Diversity. Lehigh offers excellent benefits, including domestic partner benefits, and is committed to helping employees balance the responsibilities of their professional and personal lives. The University also supports dual career efforts for partners or spouses of newly hired faculty.
To apply, please submit a cover letter, a curriculum vitae, a chapter or article-length writing sample, and complete contact information for three references to Academic Jobs Online. At a later stage of the search, candidates will be asked to provide letters of recommendation, further evidence of scholarship, evidence of teaching excellence, a research statement, and a statement of contributions to diversity, equity, and inclusion. Review of applications will begin on 7 January 2022 and continue until the position is filled.
Questions about the position should be directed to the search committee chair, Professor William J. Bulman (bulman@lehigh.edu).