Christen Crouch will be the next dean of the graduate studies at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. She will begin her new duties on July 1, 2021. Dr. Crouch has been an associate professor of history and director of American studies at Bard College since 2014.
“I am delighted that Professor Crouch has agreed to accept this vital leadership position,” said Bard College President Leon Botstein. “Graduate education has been a crucial part of the college’s mission for nearly half a century. Its significance is defined by the specific constituencies each separate program serves, the capacity of graduate education to enrich the experiences and opportunities available to undergraduate students at Bard, and the contribution the graduate programs make to the long-term sustainability of Bard.”
Dr. Crouch’s research focuses on the histories of the early modern Atlantic, comparative slavery, American material culture, and Native American and Indigenous studies. Her book, Nobility Lost: French and Canadian Martial Cultures, Indians, and the End of New France 1600–1848 (Cornell University Press, 2014) won the Mary Alice and Philip Boucher Prize for best book in French colonial history from the French Colonial Historical Society in 2015.
Dr. Crouch is a graduate of Princeton University in New Jersey, where she majored in history. She holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in history from New York University.