Alexandra Straub is an environmental historian who studies the complex entanglements between humans and the natural world over time. Her current research explores the ways that women have interacted with non-human nature, in particular the regular and intimate ways women have discussed, used, and understood water. She has published her research in both peer-reviewed journals, including Environmental History and Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies, and broad-audience publications including completing a public history project with the U.S. National Park Service. Her scholarship has been supported by the Science History Institute, the Hagley Museum and Library and the Center for the Humanities at Temple.
She is the Project Manager of the World Historical Gazetteer (WHG). Since becoming the project manager in 2021, she has overseen an expansion of the project, including the addition of over 300,000 historic georeferenced place names, the award of a $450,000 IMLS/NEH Digital Humanities Advancement Grant for 2023-2025, and the addition of a “Teaching with WHG section.”
Prior to joining the Institute for Spatial History Innovation, Alexandra was the Research Coordinator and Assistant Director of Pitt's World History Center. She is also a part time instructor in the Department of History where she teaches on topics related to world history and American history.
Education & Training
- PhD in History, Temple University in 2020