The HOTCUS Steering Committee meets four times a year. Its members for 2023-24 are:

Chair: Dr Kaeten Mistry (University of East Anglia)

Kaeten Mistry is Associate Professor of American History at the University of East Anglia. His research and teaching interests lie in the forces shaping US foreign relations, especially the interaction of national and transnational factors and domestic and foreign influences, in twentieth century international history. Kaeten studied at Birmingham and UCLA, previously taught at Warwick and UCD, and has held fellowships at Bologna, NYU and Oxford. He has published widely on the US and the World, the international cold war, dissent and whistleblowing. His current project is on the culture of state secrecy.  

As Chair, Kaeten is responsible for leading discussions within HOTCUS about its strategic priorities and how to achieve them, and for representing HOTCUS in its relations with the broader academic community and with sister organizations in the fields of US History and American Studies. 

You can contact him at: [email protected]

Vice Chair: Dr Katharina Rietzler (University of Sussex)

Katharina Rietzler is Senior Lecturer in American History and Head of American Studies at the University of Sussex, where she specializes in twentieth-century US intellectual and international history, with a focus on the history of the social sciences and women’s international thought. Katharina has previously held fellowships in Oxford and Cambridge, and is currently completing a book manuscript on American philanthropy, public opinion, and the academic field of international relations from 1913 to 1954.

As Vice Chair, she supports the Chair in defining and meeting the organisation’s strategic priorities, as well as backing other Committee members in their duties.

She can be contacted at [email protected]

Committee Secretary: Dr Miguel Hernández (Aberystwyth University)

Miguel is Lecturer in American History at Aberystwyth University, and specialises in American white supremacy and nativist movements. Originally from Madrid, Miguel has previously taught at the University of Exeter, and held fellowships at the Library of Congress and Michigan State University.  He has published several works on the Second Ku Klux Klan, including his first book on the relationship between the Second Klan and other American fraternities in the 1920s that was released in 2019 by Routledge.

As Committee Secretary, Miguel is responsible for the administrative work related to committee meetings, keeps an eye on the planning calendar to ensure we get things done in good time, manages committee elections, and runs the HOTCUS website.

You can contact him at [email protected] or follow him on twitter at @MHernandezGdV

Treasurer: Dr Zoe Hyman (University College London)

Zoe is a lecturer in US History at UCL Institute of the Americas, where she teach classes on African American civil rights, the American South since the Civil War, and London and the United States.  Her previous research has focused on American race and racism, and is currently working on a long-term project about the relationship between London and the United States from the colonial period to the present day. Before joining UCL in 2016, she worked at Queen’s University Belfast and the University of Sussex, where she completed her PhD.

As Treasurer, Zoe manages the HOTCUS finances. She is responsible for banking, preparing budgets, advising the committee on the financial implications of activities and strategic planning. 

She can be contacted at [email protected]

Membership Secretary: Dr Emma Day (University of Oxford)

Emma is a postdoctoral Fellow-in-Residence at the Rothermere American Institute at the University of Oxford. Her research interests focus on the intersections between sexuality and gender and medicine and disease. Her first book, In Her Hands: Women’s Fight Against AIDS in the United States (California, 2023), explores the interplay between women’s health activism and political action in shaping the AIDS epidemic in the US. She is currently working on a new project which examines the making of medical knowledge on the reproductive and non-reproductive body in the twentieth century US.

Within HOTCUS Emma is responsible for managing member subscriptions, emailing members about relevant news, and administering the organisation’s award schemes. 

You can contact her at [email protected].

Events Secretary: Dr Megan Hunt (University of Edinburgh)

Megan is a Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary History at the University of Edinburgh, where she specialises in the political and cultural history of the American South and the African American freedom struggle. Her main research explores the presentation of the civil rights movement in Hollywood cinema, and in particular the presentation of religion as an indicator of southern exceptionalism. She has also conducted research into how African American history is taught in UK schools, and developed teaching resources that draw connections between African American and black British history. She has previously served as HOTCUS’s first ECR secretary, where she developed the Jobs Excellence Framework (JEF), designed to assess whether advertised roles in twentieth-century American history meet the standards that we believe encourage positive and equal participation in our field. She is also a founding member of Women in American Studies.

As Events Secretary, Megan’s current role is to develop and organise the annual HOTCUS conference.

She can be contacted at [email protected]

Early Career Secretary: Dr Ellie Armon Azoulay

Ellie is a cultural historian of the late nineteenth and the twentieth-century United States and is precariously employed as a temporary lecturer of modern American history at Newcastle University. Her research is indebted to and informed by Black studies, Black feminist thought, the Black Radical Tradition, and decolonial and decolonising practices. The interdisciplinary nature of her research and pedagogy were formed by her diverse career(s) and experiences, ranging from research, curatorial work, art criticism, and DJing. She is currently working on her first monograph, Reclaiming the Lore: African American Music Collectors, Refusal and Anti-Preservationist Practices,

As Early Career Secretary, she is interested in expanding and building supportive networks for ECR/ECA, who currently face the largest living crisis combined with a flawed and exploitative academic landscape and hiring practices. As of September 2022, a new monthly meetings program that offers a platform for exchange and mutual support, as well as mentoring and consultation on various aspects pertinent to ECA/ECR’s needs, will take place in collaboration with Emily Brady – British Association of American Studies (BAAS) ECA representative.  

She can be contacted at [email protected].

Postgraduate Secretaries: Elizabeth Rees (University of Oxford); Lewis Johnson (Edinburgh University)

Elizabeth is a DPhil student at St. Catherine’s College, University of Oxford. Based at the Rothermere American Institute, her work researches the development of the role of First Lady and the expanse of the East Wing as a modern office within broader Executive politics between 1961-1976. Her project seeks to shift the focus in presidential scholarship to promote an understanding of the presidency as a head of state institution.

As one of the HOTCUS PGR representatives, Elizabeth is responsible for representing the views of the Postgraduate community, as well as ensuring that the activities that are run by HOTCUS meet the needs of Postgraduates. You can contact Emma directly, with any queries or concern by email ([email protected]) or follow her on Twitter (@lizreeshistory)

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Lewis is a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh, where he is writing his thesis on history of the Republican Party and its efforts to cultivate new support in the white South in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War. His work hopes to reorient historiographical focus on the importance of intraparty Republican developments in the demise of one-partyism in the South and argues that the early postwar years represent an important yet under researched episode in the growth of southern Republicanism, fuelled by a top-down Republican effort to exploit the electoral potential that lay south of the Mason-Dixon line.

As one of the HOTCUS PGR representatives, Lewis is responsible for representing the views of the Postgraduate community, as well as ensuring that the activities that are run by HOTCUS meet the needs of Postgraduates. You can contact Lewis directly, with any queries or concern by email (l[email protected] ) or follow him on Twitter (@lewisjohnsonUS)

Committee members are elected annually around the HOTCUS conference. Details of the election process are advertised each summer.