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Notable Achievements

Professor of History Melissa Byrnes published her book Making Space: Neighbors, Officials, and North African Migrants in the Suburbs of Paris and Lyon as part of the France Overseas: Studies in Empire and Decolonization Series at the University of Nebraska Press.

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Expertise

Modern European History, France and the French Empire, Migration, Race, Muslims and the Islamic World, Human Rights, Humanitarianism

As a professor, Dr. Melissa K Byrnes often reminds her students that she cares far more about how they think than what they know. She believes in a rigorous, interactive classroom environment. Her courses confront issues that have been hotly debated for centuries; her goal is to provide her students with a vocabulary and an analytical framework that allow them to grapple with these questions on their own. She expects students to leave her class with more open questions than they arrived with. Her job is to complicate their understandings of the world, to break down preconceptions and easy assumptions.

Byrnes received her PhD from Georgetown University in 2008, her MSFS from Georgetown University in 2003, and her BA from Amherst College in 2000. Since Jan. 2017, she has been regular contributor to Lawyers Guns & Money. She has been affiliated with the American Historical Association, the Council for European Studies, the Society for French Historical Studies, the Western Society for French History, the French Colonial Historical Society, the Social Science History Association, and the World History Association. 


In the News

  • History majors reflect on Hutching’s lecture

    Historical thinking helps students see the multifaceted nature of human experience and use it to imagine scenarios for better futures.

  • Southwestern Students Do Good and Do It Well

    SU’s BC for Change Awards the Georgetown Family YMCA a $3,500 Grant

  • Southwestern Students Do Good and Do It Well

    SU’s BC for Change Awards the Georgetown Family YMCA a $3,500 Grant