Evan Turiano is a historian interested in slavery, civil rights, politics, and law in the United States and Atlantic World during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. He received his Ph.D. from the Graduate Center, City University of New York in 2022.
He is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Wesleyan University's Center for the Study of Guns and Society. At the Center, he is working on a groundbreaking project examining the "history and tradition" of firearms, gun culture, and weapons regulation in five states in order to model how historians can participate in law and policymaking in the Bruen era. At Wesleyan, he is also an affiliated faculty member of the Departments of History and African American Studies.
Additionally, Evan is working on a book manuscript, under advance contract with LSU Press's "Antislavery, Abolition, and the Atlantic World" series, which examines the contested legal rights of African Americans accused of being fugitive slaves from before the American Revolution through the onset of the Civil War. His research offers a new origin story for the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law and demonstrates new connections between freedom seekers and the coming of the Civil War.
His scholarship has appeared in the Journal of the Civil War Era, and he has reviewed books in the Journal of Southern History, American Nineteenth Century History, Pennsylvania History, and other venues. His public writing has appeared in The Washington Post's Made By History and Jacobin. He is a contributing editor at The Gotham Center for New York City History.
His dissertation has received numerous national awards and accolades. It received the 2024 Hay-Nicolay Dissertation Prize (Abraham Lincoln Association and the Abraham Lincoln Institute), the 2023 Rachel Hines Prize (College of Charleston Carolina Lowcountry and Atlantic World Program); and the 2023 Bradford-Delaney Dissertation Prize from the St. George Tucker Society. Additionally, it was a finalist for the Southern Historical Association's C. Vann Woodward Award.
His research has been supported by fellowships from Yale University, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, the John Carter Brown Library, the Massachusetts Historical Society, the Virginia Museum of History and Culture, and the University of Virginia's Nau Center for Civil War History.
He is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Wesleyan University's Center for the Study of Guns and Society. At the Center, he is working on a groundbreaking project examining the "history and tradition" of firearms, gun culture, and weapons regulation in five states in order to model how historians can participate in law and policymaking in the Bruen era. At Wesleyan, he is also an affiliated faculty member of the Departments of History and African American Studies.
Additionally, Evan is working on a book manuscript, under advance contract with LSU Press's "Antislavery, Abolition, and the Atlantic World" series, which examines the contested legal rights of African Americans accused of being fugitive slaves from before the American Revolution through the onset of the Civil War. His research offers a new origin story for the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law and demonstrates new connections between freedom seekers and the coming of the Civil War.
His scholarship has appeared in the Journal of the Civil War Era, and he has reviewed books in the Journal of Southern History, American Nineteenth Century History, Pennsylvania History, and other venues. His public writing has appeared in The Washington Post's Made By History and Jacobin. He is a contributing editor at The Gotham Center for New York City History.
His dissertation has received numerous national awards and accolades. It received the 2024 Hay-Nicolay Dissertation Prize (Abraham Lincoln Association and the Abraham Lincoln Institute), the 2023 Rachel Hines Prize (College of Charleston Carolina Lowcountry and Atlantic World Program); and the 2023 Bradford-Delaney Dissertation Prize from the St. George Tucker Society. Additionally, it was a finalist for the Southern Historical Association's C. Vann Woodward Award.
His research has been supported by fellowships from Yale University, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, the John Carter Brown Library, the Massachusetts Historical Society, the Virginia Museum of History and Culture, and the University of Virginia's Nau Center for Civil War History.
Before coming to Wesleyan, Evan was the Macaulay Visiting Assistant Professor of History at Queens College, CUNY, where he taught courses on US History, African American History, and Legal History from 2017 to 2023.
Journal Articles
"Prophecies of Loss": Debating Slave Flight During Virginia's Secession Crisis
Evan Turiano
Journal of the Civil War Era, vol. 12(3), 2022, pp. 338-361
Encyclopedia Entries
Evan Turiano
Race and Ethnicity from Pre-contact to Present, Volume 2, ABC-Clio, 2019
Book Reviews
Evan Turiano
Pennslyvania History, vol. 90(4), 2023, pp. 647-650
Review of Bell, John Frederick, Degrees of Equality: Abolitionist Colleges and the Politics of Race
Evan Turiano
Journal of Southern History, vol. 89(3), 2023, pp. 557-558
Evan Turiano
Indiana Magazine of History and Biography, vol. 118(4), 2022, pp. 336-7
Evan Turiano
American Nineteenth Century History, vol. 23(3), 2022, pp. 315-217
Evan Turiano
Louisiana History, vol. 61(3), 2020, pp. 319-321
Review of Rugemer, Edward B., Slave Law and the Politics of Resistance in the Early Atlantic World
Evan Turiano
Southern Historian, vol. 41, 2020
Evan Turiano
H-FedHist, H-Net Reviews, 2019 Feb
Review of Sexton, Jay, A Nation Forged by Crisis: A New American History
Evan Turiano
H-CivWar, H-Net Reviews, 2019
Book in Progress
The Politics of Fugitive Slave Rendition and the Coming of the Civil War
Drawing from political history, legal theory, and the study of enslaved resistance, my book manuscript, The Politics of Fugitive Slave Rendition and the Coming of the Civil War, uncovers the conflict surrounding the contested legal rights of people acc...
Teaching
Graduate Courses
Black Citizenship in the U.S. from the Revolution to Reconstruction
Queens College, Hist. 797 (Studies in U.S. History)
This graduate course introduced students to political, legal, social, and cultural history scholarship on Black rights before the Civil War. Students had the opportunity to interact with authors who made guest appearances in class, including Kate Masur...
Undergraduate Courses
Fugitive Slaves: Fighting for Freedom in the Courts
Queens College, Hist. 288 (Law, Crime & Society in U.S. History)
This course used my research subject as a gateway to introduce History majors to topics and methods in Legal History (Spring 2021, Online, 30 students).
Nation, Community, and Identity: U.S. History to 1877 (Honors)
Queens College, Hist. 163H
This course-which I designed for first-year honors students-used early U.S. history as a lens for considered key historiographical themes including nationalism and identity-formation. I collaborated with a member of the English faculty to design a cumu...
Queens College, Hist. 260
This course introduced intermediate history students to the Early Republic and Antebellum eras, with particular focus on slavery, the Indian Removal Act, and the US War with Mexico (Fall 2020, Online, 30 students).
Queens College, Hist. 262
This course for intermediate history courses surveyed the conflict over slavery in the U.S., the political, legal, military, social, and cultural history of the war, and key themes in the Reconstruction era (Spring 2023, in person, 15 students).
Queens College, Hist. 103
This introductory history course offers students a chance to study key themes in early U.S. history, explore a range of historical methodologies, and produce a scaffolded research project (2017-2022, In-person and online, 35-55 students).
American History, 1865-present
Queens College, Hist. 104
This introductory history course offers students a chance to study key themes in contemporary U.S. history, explore a range of historical methodologies, and produce a scaffolded research project (Fall 2018, In-person, 50 students).
Faculty Development Courses
Writing In the Disciplines (WID) Faculty Seminar
LaGuardia Community College
In this seminar, I introduced faculty members to Writing in the Disciplines and Writing Across the Curriculum pedagogical techniques (2020-2021, Online, 6-8 participants).
Other Work
In addition to my scholarly work, I write articles and op-eds about politics, education, history, and New York City for a variety of national and local publications
Here are some opportunities to hear me speak about my scholarship, public interest writing, and other subjects.
Contact
Evan Turiano
Postdoctoral Researcher
