Manisha Sinha is an Indian-born American historian, and the Draper Chair in American History at the
University of Connecticut
The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university in Storrs, Connecticut, a village in the town of Mansfield. The primary 4,400-acre (17.8 km2) campus is in Storrs, approximately a half hour's drive from Hart ...
. She is the author of ''
The Slave's Cause: A History of Abolition'' (2016), which won the Frederick Douglass Book Prize.
Early life
Her father was
Srinivas Kumar Sinha
Lieutenant General Srinivas Kumar Sinha, PVSM, ADC (January 7, 1926 – November 17, 2016) was an Indian Army General who served as the Vice Chief of Army Staff. After his retirement, he served as Governor of the states of Jammu and Kashmir, ...
, an Indian Army general. She received her PhD from
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
where her dissertation was nominated for the
Bancroft Prize
The Bancroft Prize is awarded each year by the trustees of Columbia University for books about diplomacy or the history of the Americas.
It was established in 1948, with a bequest from Frederic Bancroft, in his memory and that of his brother, ...
.
Career
Sinha's research focuses on early United States history, especially the transnational histories of slavery and abolition and the history of the Civil War and Reconstruction. Sinha is the author of ''The Counterrevolution of Slavery: Politics and Ideology in Antebellum South Carolina'' (2000), which was named one of the ten best books on slavery in ''
Politico
''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American, German-owned political journalism newspaper company based in Arlington County, Virginia, that covers politics and policy in the United States and intern ...
'' in 2015.
Sinha is also a contributing author of ''The Abolitionist Imagination'' (Harvard University Press, 2012), and co-editor of ''African American Mosaic: A Documentary History from the African Slave Trade to the Twenty First Century'' (Prentice Hall, 2004) and ''Contested Democracy: Freedom, Race and Power in American History'' (Columbia University Press, 2007).
She was awarded the Chancellor's Medal, the highest honor bestowed on faculty, and received the Distinguished Graduate Mentor Award in Recognition of Outstanding Graduate Teaching and Advising at the
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, i ...
, where she taught for over twenty years. She was elected member of the
American Antiquarian Society
The American Antiquarian Society (AAS), located in Worcester, Massachusetts, is both a learned society and a national research library of pre-twentieth-century American history and culture. Founded in 1812, it is the oldest historical society in ...
, and was appointed to the
Organization of American Historians
The Organization of American Historians (OAH), formerly known as the Mississippi Valley Historical Association, is the largest professional society dedicated to the teaching and study of American history. OAH's members in the U.S. and abroad inc ...
' Distinguished Lecture Series.
Sinha has received two year-long research fellowships from the
National Endowment for the Humanities
The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...
, fellowships from the Charles Warren Center and the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute at
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
, the Howard Foundation fellowship at
Brown University
Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...
, and the Rockefeller Post-Doctoral fellowship from the Institute of the Arts and Humanities at the
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...
.
She is a member of the Council of Advisors for the Lapidus Center for the Historical Analysis of Transatlantic Slavery at the
Schomburg Center
The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture is a research library of the New York Public Library (NYPL) and an archive repository for information on people of African descent worldwide. Located at 515 Malcolm X Boulevard (Lenox Avenue) b ...
,
New York Public Library
The New York Public Library (NYPL) is a public library system in New York City. With nearly 53 million items and 92 locations, the New York Public Library is the second largest public library in the United States (behind the Library of Congress ...
, co-editor of the "Race and the Atlantic World, 1700–1900", series of the University of Georgia Press, and is on the editorial board of the ''Journal of the Civil War Era''.
Works
* ''The Counterrevolution of Slavery: Politics and Ideology in Antebellum South Carolina'', University of North Carolina Press, 2000. ,
* ''
The Slave's Cause: A History of Abolition'' New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016. ,
References
External links
* https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/168091
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sinha, Manisha
Year of birth missing (living people)
Columbia University alumni
University of Connecticut faculty
21st-century American historians
University of Massachusetts Amherst faculty
Indian emigrants to the United States
Living people
Place of birth missing (living people)
American women historians
21st-century American women
20th-century American historians
20th-century American women writers
American women writers of Indian descent
Historians of slavery