History Faculty at SUNY Plattsburgh - Dr. Richard Shaefer

History Faculty — Dr. Richard Schaefer

Assistant Professor

I am always impressed by the reciprocal influence teaching and research have on each other. Answering tough questions in the classroom forces me to think more clearly about the questions I bring to my research; and staying current with new research forces me constantly to rethink the material I teach. It is this dynamism that I love most about the profession.

European history is at an interesting crossroads. Not only is Europe itself changing, but so is how we think about it in an increasingly complex global environment. What is particularly exciting right now is how this situation has helped reframe important questions, such as religion. Where formerly assumptions about "secularization" went hand in hand with assumptions regarding modernization, the re-evaluation of the modernization paradigm has helped encourage new approaches to the complex interrelationship between the sacred and secular. This change in perspectives directly informs my current work on the European Catholic revival, and my attempt to formulate a coherent understanding of "Catholic modernity."

Education

• Ph.D. Cornell University, 2005.
• M.A. Cornell University, 1999.
• B.A. St. Jerome's College (Waterloo, Ont.), 1996.

Teaching Areas

• Modern European intellectual history.
• Religion in the modern world.
• Modern German history.
• Representing the Holocaust.
• History and literature.
• Historiography.

Research Areas

• Catholic revival.
• History of philosophy.

Recent Publications

• “Religion, Culture and the Intellectuals,” Philosophy, Culture, and Traditions (forthcoming).
• “The Madness of Franz Brentano: Secularization and the History of Philosophy,” History of European Ideas 38.3 (Fall 2012).
• “True and False Enlightenment: German Scholars and the Discourse of Catholicism in the Nineteenth Century,” Catholic Historical Review (January 2011).
• “Let’s Talk About Religion,” Perspectives on History (May 2010).
• “Catholics and the First World War: Religion, Barbarism and the Reduction to Culture,” First World War Studies 1.2 (October 2010).

Contact Richard Schaefer

Office: Champlain Valley Hall, 324
Phone: (518) 564-5211
Email: schaefr@plattsburgh.edu