Johnathan Williams
Assistant Professor
MA, University of Northern Iowa, 2016; Ph.D, Boston University, 2023
Dr. Williams' teaching interests include: Recent U.S. History, 20th Century U.S. History, Environmental History, Urban History, and U.S. Political History. He has taught classes including U.S. History to 1865, U.S. History Since 1865, American Environmental History, and Politics of the American Environment.
Dr. Williams' research specialties are 20th Century U.S. History, U.S. Urban History, Business History, and Environmental History. He is currently working on a book manuscript tentatively titled, Big-Box Nation: Target, Retail, and Creating the American Landscape, which examines how Target and other American retailers escaped late twentieth century environmental regulations to become a common feature of the American landscape, whether in rural Iowa, suburban California, or urban New York. He has a forthcoming article in Environmental History on how the legislative history of the Superfund program shifted toward a policy of reuse through public-private partnerships and a chapter on the first grassroots, environmental challenge to distribution centers in small town Wisconsin during the early 1990s in an edited volume on the environmental history of American big-box stores.
Dr. Williams has been invited to talks on environmental issues, including with the Massachusetts Historical Society, presented at numerous academic conferences, and has published an editorial in The Washington Post "Made by History" series.