Dr. Susan A Miller
Associate Professor of Childhood Studies
Undergraduate Program Coordinator
Rutgers University
329 Cooper Street – Room 211
Camden, NJ 08102
Dr. Miller joined the Rutgers-Camden Department of Childhood Studies in September 2009. She is the author of Growing Girls: The Natural Origins of Girls’ Organizations in America (Rutgers, 2007) and a contributor to several anthologies, including Scouting Frontiers: Youth and the Scout Movement’s First Century (Cambridge Scholars, 2009); Rendering Nature: Animals, Bodies, Places, Politics (UPenn, 2015); and Childhood, Youth, and Emotions in Modern History (Palgrave, 2015). She is also the author of the Oxford Online Bibliography on the History of Childhood in America. Her current research interests include children’s patriotism and nationalism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and the ways in which nineteenth-century female reformers and suffragists included younger girls in their political campaigns. Staying true to her graduate training in the history or science, she is also working on an article about Madame Curie and her daughters, Eve and Irène.
Dr. Miller teaches courses on the history of childhood and youth in America, from colonial times to the present, as well as courses on children and war, and youth sports. She is a former high school mathematics and history teacher who now spends her spare time as a volunteer tour guide at Philadelphia’s historic Laurel Hill cemetery
Education:
Ph.D in History and Sociology of Science (2001) – University of Pennsylvania
M.A in History and Sociology of Science (1996) – University of Pennsylvania
M.A. in Women’s Studies (1986) – University of York
B.A. (1983) – University of Pennsylvania
Research Interests:
Youth and Childhood in 19th and early 20th century America; history of athletics and physical education; gender and civic responsibility; science and sexuality.
Courses Taught at Rutgers-Camden:
View full CV HERE
Academic & Professional Appointments
Rutgers University, Camden, New Jersey
Associate Professor, Childhood Studies Department, 2015.
Assistant Professor, Childhood Studies Department, 2009 – 2015.
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Undergraduate Advisor, History department, 2004 – 2009.
Lecturer, Gender Studies Program and History department, 2003-2009.
Assistant Dean for Advising, The College, 2000 – 2001.
Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida
Assistant Professor, History and Politics Department, 2001 – 2003.
Delaware Valley Friends School, Bryn Mawr, PA
Teacher, mathematics and history, 1988 – 1993.
CORA- Neumann, Dropout Prevention Project, Philadelphia, PA
GED Teacher, 1986 – 1988.
Publications
Books
Growing Girls: The Natural Origins of Girls’ Organizations in America, Rutgers University Press, 2007.
Chapters and Articles
“Agency as Assent in the Early Years of the Children of the American Revolution,” Vol.9 no. 1 (Winter 2016) Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth.
“Feeling Like a Citizen: The American Legion’s Boys State Programme and the Promise of Americanism” in Stephanie Olsen, ed. Childhood, Youth and Emotions in Modern History: National, Colonial, and Global Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, 2015.
“The Gulick Family and the Nature of Adolescence,” in Rendering Nature: Animals, Bodies, Places, Politics, Phoebe S. K.Young and Marguerite S. Shaffer, eds. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015.
“Trademark: Scout” in Scouting Frontiers: Youth and the Scout Movement’s First Century, Tammy M. Proctor and Nelson R. Block, eds. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009.
“History of Childhood (America),” Oxford Bibliographies Online, Fall 2011.
Select Book Reviews
Defining Deviance: Sex, Science and Delinquent Girls, 1890-1960, by Michael A. Rembis. Journal of the History of Sexuality, Vol. 23, no. 2, May 2014.
Beyond Nature’s Housekeepers: American Women in Environmental History, by Nancy C. Unger. Journal of American History, Vol. 100, no. 4, March 2014.
The Nation in Children’s Literature: Nations of Childhood, by Christopher (Kit) Kelen and Bjorn Sundmark, eds. The Lion & the Unicorn, 37.3, September 2013.
Scouting for Girls: A Century of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, by Tammy M. Proctor, Journal of Social History, (Winter 2011) 45 (2): 541-542.
Babysitter: An American History, by Miriam Forman-Brunell, Enterprise & Society, (September 2011).
A Manufactured Wilderness: Summer Camps and the Shaping of American Youth, 1890–1960, by Abigail van Slyck and “A Paradise for Boys and Girls”: Children’s Camps in the Adirondacks, by Hallie Bond, Joan Jacobs Brumberg and Leslie Paris, Winterthur Portfolio, Volume 42, no. 1, Spring 2008.
Selected Presentations
“Drawing Sustenance: Children’s Art in the Aftermath of War,” War and Childhood in the Age of the World Wars: Local and Global Perspectives, conference sponsored by German Historical Institute, Washington DC, Upcoming, June 2014.
“Into the Room of Suffering: American Youth and Foreign Relief Work during WWI,” Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Toronto, Canada, Upcoming, May 2014.
“A Boy-sized Nation: Youth Newspapers and the Creation of Civic Space,” Society for the History of Children and Youth, Nottingham, England, June 2013.
“The CAR Goes To War: Loyalty and Memory during WWI,” Center for the History of Emotions, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany, November 2012.
“A Young Miss Abroad: Internationalism of Girl Scouting,” Women’s and Gender Historians of the Midwest, Grand Rapids, MI, October 2012.
“Can Interdisciplinarity be a Discipline?” Society for the History of Children and Youth, New York City, June 2011.
“Pink State, Blue State: The American Legion and the Gender of Americanism,” Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Amherst, MA, June 2011.
“Title IX: Gender Equity and Athletics at Penn,” A Panel Discussion marking the 30th Anniversary of Women’s Studies. Philadelphia, PA, March 2004.
“It Takes a Primitive Woman: The Role of Women in the Creation of the Appalachian
Trail,” Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Chapel Hill, NC, June, 1996.
Editorial
Book Review Editor
Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth, September 2009 – 2013.
Media Appearances
Quoted in “Childhood’s End: What Living Longer Might Mean for Kids and Teens,” by Katy Waldman, in Future Tense, Slate Online, November 1. 2013.
Quoted in “Girl Scouts 100th Anniversary,”Sachi Fujimori, North Jersey Record, March 11,2012.
Quoted in “Girl Scout’s 100th Birthday, Charting a Century of Change in American Girlhood,” by Monica Hesse, Washington Post, March 4, 2012.
Quotes in “At 100, Girl Scouts selling more than cookies,” by Eric Aasan, Dallas Morning News, front page, January 22, 2012.
Quoted in “The Girl Scouts’ Allegedly Radical Feminist Lesbian Agenda,” by Amanda Marcotte , Slate Online, September 15, 2011.
Interviewed in “The Armored Child,” by Leon Neyfakh, Boston Globe, August, 2011.
Quoted in “Survival Tactics for the Scouts: Blending New and Old Traditions,” by Maureen West, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, January 9, 2011.
Interviewed for CBS Weekend News, Feature on Girl Scout history, March 2009.
Quoted in “Blogs In, Badges Out as Girl Scouts Modernize,” by Megan Greenwell, Washington Post, front page, March 2, 2009.
Interviewed for “Influences: Ann Meredith,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 13, 2008.