Former Member of Staff: Dr Chris Pearson
![]() |
Dr Pearson was Assistant Professor of French History at warwick university from 2010 to 2012. |
Academic Profile
-
Assistant Professor of French History, University of Warwick (2010-2012)
-
Research Associate, AHRC Project 'Militarized Landscapes in Twentieth-Century Britain, France and the United States', University of Bristol (2007-2010)
-
PhD, Department of Historical Studies, University of Bristol (2003-2006)
-
MA, Department of Historical Studies, University of Bristol (2002-2003)
-
BA (Hons) University of Sussex (1997-2001)
Undergraduate Modules Taught
Research
My research interests lie predominantly in modern French history. They focus on the environmental and cultural history of war and animal history. My doctoral research and subsequent monograph form the first environmental history of Vichy France and outline the material and cultural importance of nature during the ‘dark years’ and their aftermath. This led to postdoctoral work on French and transnational militarized landscapes and my second monograph on the environmental history of war and militarization in France from the mid-nineteenth century to the present day (forthcoming with Manchester University Press). My current project ‘ Canine City : Dogs, Humans, and the Making of Modern Paris’ will explore the role and presence of dogs in the city’s past as workers, pets, pests, and beyond. It furthers my interests in nonhuman agency and “more-than-human” histories and is supported by the British Academy . I also explore animal (specifically canine) history on my blog Sniffing the Past
Selected Publications
Books
-
Mobilizing Nature: The Environmental History of War and Militarization in Modern France (Manchester: Manchester University Press, forthcoming 2012)
-
Scarred Landscapes: War and Nature in Vichy France (Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan, 2008)
-
Militarized Landscapes: From Gettysburg to Salisbury Plain, co-editor (with Peter Coates and Tim Cole), (London: Continuum, 2010)
Journal articles
-
'Researching Militarized Landscapes: A Literature Review on War and the Militarization of the Environment,’ Landscape Research 37:1 (2012), 115-33
-
‘La politique environnementale de Vichy',' Vingtième siècle 113 (January 2012), 41-50
-
(with Peter Coates, Tim Cole, and Marianna Dudley), ‘Defending nation, defending nature? Militarized Landscapes and Military Environmentalism in Britain, France and the US, ' Environmental History 16:3 (July 2011): 456-91
-
"A 'Watery Desert' in Vichy France: The Environmental History of the Camargue Wetlands, 1940-1944" French Historical Studies 32/3 (Summer 2009), 479-509
-
"L'âge du bois: les forêts françaises pendant la Seconde guerre mondiale" Revue forestière française 4 (July-August 2007), 393-416
-
"'The Age of Wood': Fuel and Fighting in French Forests, 1940-1944" Environmental History 11 (October 2006), 775-803
Book Chapters
-
"Beneath the Camouflage: Revealing Militarized Landscapes,' (with Peter Coates and Tim Cole), in Militarized Landscapes: From Gettysburg to Salisbury Plain co-editor (with Peter Coates and Tim Cole), (London: Continuum, 2010)
-
"Creating the Natural Fortress: Landscape, Resistance, and Memory in the Vercors, France" in Charles Closmann (ed) War and the Environment: Military Destruction in the Modern Age (College Station, TX:Texas A&M Press, 2009), 150-76
other
- 'A Walk in the Park with Timmy: History, and the Possibilities of Companion Species Research,' The Wild 1 (2009), 87-96
In 2010-2011 I was a participant on the AHRC-funded network 'Environmental History: Local Places, Global Processes'