Dr. Marc Lerner is the Associate Professor of History in the Department of History at the University of Mississippi.
Research Interests
Dr. Marc Lerner focuses on revolutionary Europe in comparative perspective, republicanism and the shift to a modern political world. His current book project, “The International William Tell: A Republican Symbol in the Age of Revolution," seeks to examine the trans-national Age of Revolution through the lens of William Tell. The William Tell story provides an innovative way to capture the breadth of the period. Tell, an internationally used symbol and flexible cultural production, is a framing device through which we can analyze the entire revolutionary period. Revolutionary ideals, principles and problems were not bound by national borders; instead, he can use the Tell story (and how it was used by contemporaries) as a thread to connect various revolutionary experiences and examine civic discourse, the republican tradition, popular culture and the jagged transformation of political culture in the Age of Revolution. The William Tell story was used by authors, playwrights, songwriters, musicians, composers, poets, painters, engravers, print-makers, clock-makers, politicians, and other political actors and members of the public to discuss fundamental issues of modern politics: who makes up the sovereign body politic, who are the free citizens entitled to natural and civil rights, and who is allowed to participate in the making of a modern political society?
This work builds on his first book, A Laboratory of Liberty. In this book, he looked at three different cantons in Switzerland as a way to understand the shift to a politically modern federal state from an early modern confederation. By looking at the republics of Switzerland, with both German speaking and French speaking areas, we can better understand the revolutionary period in Europe as a whole.
Biography
Dr. Marc Lerner earned his PhD from Columbia University. He has been a member of the faculty at the University of Mississippi since 2005 and regularly teaches courses on the Enlightenment, the French Revolution and the Age of Revolution and Nationalism. My research interests are focused on revolutionary Europe in comparative perspective, republicanism and the shift to a modern political world.
Publications
The Atlantic Origins of American Slavery
From the publisher:
Beyond 1619 brings an Atlantic and hemispheric perspective to the year 1619 as a marker of American slavery’s origins and the beginnings of the Black experience in what would become the United States by situating the roots of racial slavery in a broader, comparative context.
In recent years, an extensive public dialogue regarding the long shadow of racism in the United States has pushed Americans to confront the insidious history of race-based slavery and its aftermath, with 1619—the year that the first recorded enslaved persons of African descent arrived in British North America—taking center stage as its starting point. Yet this dialogue has inadvertently narrowed our understanding of slavery, race, and their repercussions to the U.S. context. Beyond 1619 showcases the fruitful results when scholars examine and put into conversation multiple empires, regions, peoples, and cultures to get a more complete view of the rise of racial slavery in the Americas.
Selected Book(s):
A Laboratory of Liberty: The Transformation of Political Culture in Republican Switzerland, 1750-1848 (Leiden: Brill, 2012). (Paperback edition: Leiden: Brill, 2014).,with Paul J. Polgar and Jesse Cromwell, eds.
"Switzerland: Local Agency and French Intervention: The Helvetic Republic," in The Cambridge History of the Age of Atlantic Revolutions vol. 2 The Global French Revolution, ed. Wim Klooster (Cambridge University Press, 2023): 303-325.
Selected Article(s):
"The William Tell Story as a Transnational Approach to the Age of Revolutions" In Annales historiques de la Révolution française, 2019/3 No 397 , pages 55 to 75.
"Performing William Tell in the Transatlantic World," in Transatlantic Revolutionary Culture, eds. Charlotte Lerg and Heléna Tóth (Leiden: Brill, 2018).
"Competing Memories of a Swiss Revolt: the Prism of the William Tell Legend," in Rhythms of Revolt: European Traditions and Memories of Social Conflict in Oral Culture, eds. Éva Guillorel, David Hopkin, William G. Pooley (London and New York: Routledge, 2018). (Paperback edition: Routledge, 2019).
"Mémoires contradictoires d’une révolte suisse: le prisme de la légende de Guillaume Tell," French translation by Pierre Bouthillier (Presse Universitaires de Rennes, 2020).
Courses Taught
- HIST 1200 Intro to European History to 1648
- HIST 1210 Intro to European History since 1648
- HIST 3230 Age of Absolutism and Enlightenment
- HIST 3260 Age of Revolution, 1750-1850
- HIST 3350 The French Revolution
- HIST 3360 The Napoleonic Era
- HIST 5510 Historiography of Europe to 1815
- HIST 6510 Readings in European History to 1815
- HIST 6610 Europe and Atlantic World
- HONR 1010 Freshman Honors I
- HONR 1020 Freshman Honors II
Education
Ph.D. History, Columbia University in the City of New York (2003)
B.A. History, University of Chicago (1993)
Recognitions
- Humanities Teacher of the Year, University of Mississippi College of Liberal Arts, 2017