Explore the range of faculty engagement with world regions and global issues by browsing the Faculty Database System or by searching for particular keywords (major world area, country, research topic, etc).

While the Duke International website strives to provide a comprehensive listing of Duke faculty with international research interests, you may also find additional information by exploring school-specific faculty listings

John D. French, Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies, History

Contact Info:

Office Location:	331 Classroom Building
Office Phone:	(919) 684-3014
Email Address:

Teaching (Spring 2026):

• HISTORY 142S.01, PHOTOGRAPHY AND HISTORY Synopsis

  Old Chem 119, TuTh 11:45 AM-01:00 PM

• HISTORY 264.01, LATIN AM WARS OF INDEPENDENCE Synopsis

  Gross Hall 105, WF 03:05 PM-04:20 PM

  (also cross-listed as AAAS 264.01, ICS 232.01, POLSCI 257.01)

Education:

Ph.D.	Yale University	1985
MA	University of Pittsburgh	1978
BA (Magna cum laude)	Amherst College	1975

Specialties:

Gender
Labor and Working Class History
Legal History
Politics, Public Life and Governance
Race and Ethnicity
Latin America and the Caribbean
Global and Comparative

Research Interests:

Current projects: Since 1984, I have been co-coordinator of the Latin American Labor History Conference held in April of each year at Duke, and I have served since 2001 as Director of the Duke Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies and since 2002 as Director of the Carolina and Duke Consortium in Latin American and Caribbean Studies. I also serve as Associate Editor for Latin America and the Caribbean for the journal Labor: Studies in Working Class History of the Americas, under its new editor Leon Fink (University of Illinois-Chicago).

An historian of modern Latin America with a specialization in Brazil, my most recent book entitled Drowning in Laws: Labor Law and Brazilian Political Culture was published in 2004. I will be on a residential at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in AY 2005-2006 to finish a book on the origin of Brazilian president Luis Inacio Lula da Silva entitled "Building Movements in a World in Flux: Leadership, Consciousness, and Mobilization among Metalworkers in São Paulo, Brazil 1950-1980." I have active ongoing research projects dealing with labor and globalization, as well as on "The Potential of Diasporic Dialogue: The Intersection of Afro-North America and Afro-Latin America in the Twentieth Century."

Keywords:

Latin America • Brazil • WTO

Curriculum Vitae

Recent Publications   (More Publications)

1. French, JD, Common Men, Exceptional Politicians: What Do We Gain from an Embodied Social Biographical Approach to Leftist Leaders Like Germany's August Bebel and Brazil's Luis Inácio Lula da Silva?, International Review of Social History, vol. 68 no. 1 (April, 2023), pp. 111-121, Cambridge University Press (CUP) [doi]  [abs]
2. French, JD, Epilogue: Authoritarianism and the Specter of Democracy, International Review of Social History, vol. 68 no. 1 (April, 2023), pp. 173-175 [doi]
3. French, JD, The Robert J. Alexander Interview Collection, Politicas De La Memoria, vol. 2022 no. 22 (December, 2022), pp. 293-300 [doi]  [abs]
4. French, JD, Charisma's Birth from the Bottom Up: Lula, ABC's Metalworkers' Strikes and the Social History of Brazilian Politics, Journal of Latin American Studies, vol. 54 no. 4 (November, 2022), pp. 705-729 [doi]  [abs]
5. French, JD, Jeffrey L. Gould. Solidarity under Siege: The Salvadoran Labor Movement, 1970–1990., The American Historical Review, vol. 126 no. 4 (February, 2022), pp. 1670-1671, Oxford University Press (OUP) [doi]

I have received major fellowships from: Fulbright-Hays (1981-1982, 2000), Inter-American Foundation (1981-83), Social Science Research Council (1981-83, 1991) the National Humanities Center (1995-96), and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (2005-2006). In addition, my external grants include: American Philosophical Society (1998), American Council of Learned Societies (1991), National Endowment for the Humanities (1998, 1991), National Historical Publications and Records Commission (1998-2000) and North-South Center (1994)