Rosemary Feurer 

Associate Professor

Fields of Study: United States-20th Century, Labor, Social Movements

E-mail: rfeurer@niu.edu
Phone: 815-753-6815
Office: Zulauf 618

Education: Ph.D., Washington University, St. Louis, 1997

Current Research: 

• My research and teaching interests focus on understanding the political economy of social conflict. I focus on labor issues and conflict within the context of U.S. capitalist development spatially, socially and economically during the late nineteenth and twentieth century. Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 (2006) explored labor radicalism as well as political repression of an important cohort of businessmen determined to make the Midwest a location of capitalist accumulation. I have always connected my research to public history projects, including tours, electronic media, oral history and video production. My current research project is both a monograph and documentary on the epic mine wars in Illinois in the late nineteenth century, which involved class, race and political conflict. In addition, I am continuing my research on conservative businessmen in the Midwest in the period from 1900-1960 and a number of other smaller projects. I manage the largest website on labor history in the U.S. www.laborhistorylinks.niu.edu, and one on Mother Jones, www.motherjonesmuseum.org

Major/Recent Publications:

• Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 Working Class in American History Series, University of Illinois Press 2006. Winner of the Wentworth Prize in U.S. History, 2007

• Mother Jones: America’s Most Dangerous Woman (2007)  Winner of Geneva Film Festival prize, 2007
• “Labor’s Community-Based Economic and Environmental Planning, and Cold War Politics: The UE’s St. Louis District, 1941-1946,”  in Shelton Stromquist, ed. Labor and the Cold War: Local Politics in a Global Context (University of Illinois Press, 2008) [A volume in the series The Working Class in American History Series]
• “How and Where to Look for Corruption?” Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas, Summer 2011 8(2)
• “"Learning From and Rethinking the Staley Struggle of the 1990s"  WorkingUSA: The Journal of Labor and Society 13 (1) March 2010, 153-168   
• Union Myths versus Union Democracy,” Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas, Spring 2012 9(2) 

Teaching Interests:

I have taught numerous courses in U.S. history, including Labor History, U.S. Capitalism, Social Protest Movements, Radicalism, Political Repression, and the U.S. Survey.

Courses Taught:

See her webpage for more information:  www.laborhistorylinks.niu.edu