ASU History Professor Publishes First Book

Dr. Jason Pierce of the Angelo State University history faculty has published his first book, titled Making the White Man’s West: Whiteness and the Creation of the American West, through University Press of Colorado, said a press release Tuesday.

Released this month, Making of the White Man’s West is the first comprehensive study to examine the construction of white racial identity in the American West. The region, especially the intermountain states, ranks among the whitest places in America, but this fact obscures its more complicated history of racial diversity. Pierce argues that since the time of the Louisiana Purchase, the American West has been a racially contested space. Using a nuanced theory of historical “whiteness,” he examines why and how Anglo-Americans dominated the region for a 120-year period.

Pierce, an assistant professor in ASU’s Department of History, has taught courses in U.S. history, the American West, public history, and environmental history since coming to Angelo State in 2009. He has contributed articles to Southwestern Historical Quarterly and The Oregon Historical Quarterly. He earned his doctorate at the University of Arkansas, his master’s degree at Portland State University in Oregon and his bachelor’s degree at Fort Lewis College in Colorado.

Making of the White Man’s West is available in electronic and paper editions from retailers, including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and iBook and www.upcolorado.com.

For more information, contact Pierce at 325-942-2199 or [email protected].