Faculty Focus: Nadja Durbach, Professor of History

Nadja Durbach is an historian of nineteenth and twentieth-century Britain who is particularly interested in the history of the body. She has taught in the History Department at the University of Utah since 2000. She teaches courses in British history, the history of medicine and the body, historical research methods, as well as the European history survey course. Her research focuses on questions around the body, citizenship, and identity, themes that she also incorporates into her teaching. She has published books on the Victorian anti-vaccination movement, the Victorian freak show, and government food programs offered between the 1830s and the 1960s.

“The library is essential to my teaching and to my research. In my British history courses I use databases such as “Victorian Popular Culture” and “Mass Observation” so that students have the opportunity to work with primary sources,” Nadja explains. “When I teach The Historian’s Craft, our course on historical research methods, the library is critical. I have partnered with librarians to teach students how to find both secondary and primary sources for their research projects. They learn how to use article databases such as JSTOR and Historical Abstracts as well as to search the catalog and the shelves for primary and secondary sources.”

When the class meets live, Nadja and her students do this as a hands-on experience in the library so that she can help students navigate the databases as well as help them to find books on the shelves. “One of the lessons I try to instill in students is that browsing the open shelves of the library is often the best way to find what you didn’t even know that you were looking for,” comments Nadja. She encourages them to spend time in the stacks in order to allow for a serendipitous discovery. Sometimes she has them complete a scavenger hunt in order to challenge them to find a range of items of different types. “In the age of Covid-19, we can’t do this. But the librarians have been marvelous resources. They created video tutorials to help students learn how to use the library’s databases from home.” This includes databases that contain historical documents such as newspapers, digitized archival materials, and government documents.

Nadja also encourages her students to work with the research librarians who have expertise in finding a huge range of materials. “My own work as scholar couldn’t be done without the library. I rely on its collections of published scholarship and use the Interlibrary Loan services extensively. The librarians’ willingness to acquire materials and databases that aid in my research has been essential to my ability to produce scholarly books and articles.”