Julia Mickenberg
Core Faculty — Ph. D., University of Minnesota
Professor

Contact
- E-mail: mickenberg@austin.utexas.edu
- Phone: 512-232-2650
- Office: BUR 420
- Office Hours: Spring 2020: Tuesdays 12:30-3:30
- Campus Mail Code: B7100
Interests
History of the Left/radical cultures, women's history, history of childhood and children's literature, Russian studies, Americans abroad, utopia
Biography
Julia L. Mickenberg grew up in Connecticut, about 90 miles from New York City. She holds an A.B. degree in American Civilization from Brown University and a Ph.D. in American Studies (with a minor in Feminist Studies) from the University of Minnesota. Prior to graduate school, she did work in public history, at the Smithsonian Institution, the Old York Historical Society (in York Maine), and with the National Park Service in Stehekin, Washington. Before starting as an assistant professor at UT in 2001 she taught history at Pitzer College in Claremont, California. In her spare time, she enjoys yoga, running, hiking, and reading fiction.
Publications and Scholarly Work
Julia Mickenberg's book, American Girls in Red Russia: Chasing the Soviet Dream, was published in spring 2017 by University of Chicago Press. Expanding on that research, in the fall of 2019 she published “The Bolshevik Revolution Had Descended on Me": Madeleine Z. Doty’s Russian Revolution, extracted from Doty’s Behind the Battle Line, annotated, and with a new introduction. Mickenberg is also the author of Learning from the Left: Children's Literature, The Cold War, and Radical Politics in the United States (Oxford UP: 2006), which won awards from the Society for the History of Children and Youth, the Children's Literature Association, the Pacific Coast Branch of the American Historical Association, and the UT Cooperative Society. She is also co-editor of Tales for Little Rebels: A Collection of Radical Children's Literature (NYU: 2008) and The Oxford Handbook of Children's Literature (2011), which won the Children's Literature Association's 2011 Edited Book Award. She has also published articles and book chapters in venues including the Journal of American History, American Quarterly, The Children's Literature Association Quarterly and American Literary History. She recently published "Radical Children’s Literature for Adults at the Inner City Goose” in the open-access journal Barnboken. Learn more about American Girls in Red Russia: Chasing the Soviet Dream here.
Research Interests
Professor Mickenberg is an interdisciplinary historian of women, children, and radical cultures in the twentieth century. She is interested in the cultural milieu of leftist political movements involving women and children; and in the tension between utopian desire (for more just and satisfying social arrangements) and the practical realities of human fallibility, abuse of power, and limited resources. She is drawn toward unexplored and repressed dimensions of the historical record, including stories of individuals and communities (local, national, and international) whose significance has heretofore been overlooked. Her effort to understand and reveal these dynamics is undergirded by deep archival research, close reading, and oral history. Through courses taught and in her role as a leader of the campus conversations and chair of the faculty innovation task force, she became increasingly interested in higher education as an institution of both liberatory possibility and social control. As a Provost Teaching Fellow she is working on highlighting the value of the humanities.
Courses Taught
Professor Mickenberg teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on U.S. cultural history, the cultures of American radicalism, Americans abroad, childhood studies, women radicals and reformers, life writing, and the 1960s. She regularly teaches a Plan II Honors course on College and Controversy, and collaboratively taught a course with Kate Catterall (Design) and Rich Reddick (Educational Administration) on the History and Future of Higher Education, subject of their co-authored article in Radical Teacher.
Media Appearances
Rag Radio, American Girls in Red Russia: Chasing the Soviet Dream
Stars and Tsars: Backstory with the American History Guys
Rag Radio, the History and Future of Higher Education
Book TV, discussing Tales for Little Rebels
To the Best of Our Knowledge, discussing Learning from the Left
The Leonard Lopate show, WNYC, discussing Tales for Little Rebels
Against the Grain, KPFA, discussing Tales for Little Rebels
Courses
AMS 356 • Main Cur Amer Cul Sinc 1865-Wb
31590 • Spring 2021
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM
Internet; Synchronous
CD
HI
AMS 386 • Cultrl His Of Us Since 1865-Wb
31645 • Spring 2021
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM
Internet; Synchronous
(also listed as HIS 392, WGS 393)
AMS 386 • Cultural Hist Of Us Since 1865
31649 • Spring 2021
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
Hybrid/Blended
WGS 345 • Wmn Radicals & Reformers-Wb
44550 • Fall 2020
Meets TTH 2:00PM-3:30PM
Internet; Synchronous
CDIIWr
AMS 390 • Life Writing
31229 • Spring 2020
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
(also listed as E 395M, WGS 393)
UGS 302 • College And Controversy
60400 • Fall 2019
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM MAI 220A
CDWr
ID
AMS 390 • Second Wave Feminism Now
31275 • Fall 2018
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
(also listed as WGS 393)
AMS S370 • Children's Lit And Amer Cul
79745 • Summer 2018
Meets MTWTHF 11:30AM-1:00PM BUR 436A
CDIIWr
AMS 370 • Women Radicals & Reformers
30960 • Fall 2017
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 436A
CDIIWr
(also listed as WGS 345)
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
30685 • Fall 2016
Meets TTH 2:00PM-3:30PM UTC 1.132
CD
HI
(also listed as HIS 356K)
T C 302 • College And Controversy
42775 • Fall 2016
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 436B
Wr
ID
AMS 370 • History & Future Of Higher Ed
29884 • Spring 2016
Meets W 12:00PM-3:00PM PCL 2.500
AMS 390 • Sea Changes In The Sixties
29955 • Spring 2016
Meets TH 11:00AM-2:00PM BUR 436B
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
30050 • Fall 2015
Meets TTH 12:30PM-2:00PM BUR 134
CD
(also listed as HIS 356K)
AMS 370 • Children's Lit And Amer Cul
30070 • Fall 2015
Meets TTH 3:30PM-5:00PM BUR 436A
CDIIWr
(also listed as WGS 340)
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
30160 • Spring 2015
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 134
CD
AMS 386 • Cultural Hist Of Us Since 1865
30215 • Spring 2015
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
(also listed as WGS 393)
AMS 370 • Exiles/Expats/Pol Pilgrims
31015 • Fall 2014
Meets TTH 2:00PM-3:30PM BUR 228
CDGCWr
T C 302 • College And Controversy
43360 • Fall 2014
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 436B
Wr
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
31180 • Spring 2014
Meets TTH 9:30AM-11:00AM BUR 134
CD
HI
(also listed as HIS 356K)
AMS 386 • Cultural Hist Of Us Since 1865
31220 • Spring 2014
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
AMS 370 • Socty, Cul, Polit In 1960s
30860 • Fall 2013
Meets TTH 2:00PM-3:30PM GEA 127
CDWr
T C 302 • College And Controversy
43400 • Fall 2013
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM CRD 007A
Wr
AMS 370 • Children's Lit And Amer Cul
30800 • Spring 2013
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 228
CDWr
(also listed as E 324)
AMS 390 • Childhood Studies
30830 • Spring 2013
Meets T 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
(also listed as WGS 393)
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
30605 • Fall 2011
Meets TTH 2:00PM-3:30PM BUR 134
CD
HI
(also listed as HIS 356K)
AMS 370 • Exiles/Expats/Politcl Pilgrims
30620 • Fall 2011
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 228
GCWr
AMS 398T • Supv Teaching In American Stds
30975 • Spring 2011
Meets TH 9:00AM-12:00PM BUR 436B
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
29615 • Fall 2010
Meets TTH 12:30PM-2:00PM BUR 134
CD
HI
(also listed as HIS 356K)
AMS 370 • Socty, Cul, Polit In 1960s
29670 • Fall 2010
Meets TTH 9:30AM-11:00AM GAR 0.120
CDWr
AMS 390 • Modnsm, Feminism, & Radicalism
29425 • Spring 2009
Meets W 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
(also listed as WGS 393)
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
30070 • Fall 2008
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 108
HI
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
29850 • Spring 2008
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM UTC 4.110
HI
AMS 386 • Cultural Hist Of Us Since 1865
29895 • Spring 2008
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 436B
AMS 398T • Supv Teaching In American Stds
30580 • Fall 2007
Meets TH 9:00AM-12:00PM UTC 4.120
WGS 345 • Women Radicals And Reformers-W
48425 • Spring 2007
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BIO 301
C2
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
29965 • Fall 2006
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM BUR 216
HI
AMS 390 • Childhd/Youth: Interdis Persp
30060 • Fall 2006
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM BUR 228
AMS 356 • Main Curr Amer Cul Since 1865
28095 • Fall 2005
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM UTC 4.134
HI
AMS 310 • Intro To American Studies
27750 • Fall 2004
Meets TTH 11:00AM-12:30PM GSB 2.126
HI
(also listed as HIS 306N)
AMS 390 • Cold War Culture
27952 • Fall 2004
Meets TH 2:00PM-5:00PM PAR 214
AMS 310 • Intro To American Studies
26155 • Spring 2004
Meets TTH 3:30PM-5:00PM GAR 1
HI
(also listed as HIS 306N)
AMS 390 • Cultures Of Amer Radicalism
26305 • Spring 2004
Meets TH 9:00AM-12:00PM CBA 4.336
(also listed as WGS 393)
WGS 394 • Conf Crs In Wom'S/Gend Studies
46095 • Fall 2003
AMS 390 • Childhd/Youth: Interdis Persp
25690 • Spring 2003
Meets TH 9:00AM-12:00PM CBA 4.336
WGS 345 • Women Radicals And Reformers-W
45650 • Fall 2002
Meets TTH 3:30PM-5:00PM GAR 203
C2
AMS 390 • Popular Front
25990 • Spring 2002
Meets W 9:00AM-12:00PM GAR 301
AMS 310 • Intro To American Studies
26485 • Fall 2001
Meets TTH 2:00PM-3:30PM UTC 4.122
HI
(also listed as HIS 306N)
Recent Press Coverage
Publicity for American Girls in Red Russia: Chasing the Soviet Dream
Media Appearances
Publications
Books
American Girls in Red Russia: Chasing the Soviet Dream (University of Chicago Press, 2017).
Leaning from the Left: Children's Literature, the Cold War, and Radical Politics in the United States (Oxford U.P., 2006).
Tales for Little Rebels: A Collection of Radical Children's Literature, edited with Philip Nel (New York U.P., 2008).
The Oxford Handbook of Children's Literature. Edited with Lynne Vallone. (Oxford U.P., 2011).