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Mara Oliva

Staff profile placeholder

Director of MA in History

Postgraduate supervision

I have supervised many MA dissertations on 20th century US history

I am currently supervising two PhD students:

  • Dafydd Townley: Spies, Civil Liberties, and the Senate: The 1975 Church Committee'
  • Darius Wainwright: Cultural diplomacy, soft power, the 'special relationship', foreign policy, Middle East history
  • American political history;
  • US foreign policy;
  • US Presidency;
  • Cold War; role of domestic politics in US foreign policy making (especially public opinion and media);
  • Sino-American relations;
  • Sino-American culture in the US;
  • Climate Change Diplomacy, Public Diplomacy, Digital Humanities.

Teaching

Undergraduate

Part One:

  • contribution to Journeys Through History 1 & Research Skills and Opportunities;
  • Option: From Berlin to Baghdad: The Origins of the War on Terror

Part Two Option:

  • The American Dream? US History from Colonial Times to late twentieth century

Part Three Option:

  • The US and the Cold War

Special Subject:

  • The US and China in the historical context

Postgraduate

  • Contribution to MA programme core modules;
  • option: US Foreign Policy in 20th & 21st centuries

Professional bodies/affiliations

I am the Vice-Chair of the of the American Politics Group (APG)

I am co-director of The Monroe Group

Member of:

  • Historians of the Twentieth Century US (HOTCUS)
  • British Association of American Studies (BAAS)
  • Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR)

Further information:

Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Publications

  • Oliva, M. (2020) Nixon in China. In: Morgan, I. and White, M. , (eds.) The Presidential Image: A History from Theodore Roosevelt to Donald Trump. I.B. Tauris , London. ISBN: 97811788313599