Dr. Susan Myers-Shirk
Professor | MTSU Director of General Education
Departments / Programs
Degree Information
- PHD, Pennsylvania State University (1994)
- MA, Pennsylvania State University (1988)
- BA, Messiah College (1980)
Areas of Expertise
U.S. Cultural and Intellectual History
Biography
My research and teaching interests intersect in the history of values. I teach courses about how Americans have made moral and aesthetic choices, offering topics courses on the history of cultural rebellion, alternative spirituality, and road culture, as well as a course on how cultural hierarchies are created. I have a particular weakness for interdisciplinary approaches. My current research unites all of my interests—psychology (consciousness), spirituality, road culture (pilgrimage),...
Read More »My research and teaching interests intersect in the history of values. I teach courses about how Americans have made moral and aesthetic choices, offering topics courses on the history of cultural rebellion, alternative spirituality, and road culture, as well as a course on how cultural hierarchies are created. I have a particular weakness for interdisciplinary approaches. My current research unites all of my interests—psychology (consciousness), spirituality, road culture (pilgrimage), environmentalism, landscape, and geography—in a new project tentatively titled The Secret Life of the Counterculture.
Publications
Myers-Shirk, Susan. Helping the Good Shepherd: Pastoral Counselors in a Psychotherapeutic Culture, 1925-1975. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009.
Awards
MTSU Outstanding Achievement in Instructional Technology Award, 2007-2008 Visiting Fellow, Spring 1998, Center for the Study of American Religion, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ Faculty Fellow, 1997-1998, Pew Program in Religion and American History, Yale University, New Haven, CT
Courses
Undergraduate Courses Taught History 2010, Survey United States History I History 2020, Survey United States History II History 4740, U.S. Cultural and Intellectual History History 3040 Topics in U. S. Cultural History; topics include history of the counterculture, post-1965 alternative spirituality, and road culture Graduate Courses Taught History 6010, Historiography History 6020, Historical Research Methods History 6105, Seminar: Research in American History
