
Ryan Hall
Department/Office Information
HistoryRyan Hall is an historian of the North American West, in particular Indigenous-newcomer relations and borderlands history. His first book, Beneath the Backbone of the World: Blackfoot People and the North American Borderlands, 1720-1877, was a history of the Blackfoot (Niitsitapi) people of what is now Montana and Alberta during the era of the fur trade. It told the story of how Blackfoot people used the ancient geography of their homelands to preserve their way of life during the chaotic early years of American and Canadian expansion.
His current research examines the long history of corruption and theft in America's "Indian Affairs" administration and asks how forms of graft shaped U.S. westward expansion and the Indigenous experience during the nineteenth century. To learn more about Professor Hall's past and current research, listen to his recent podcast interview with the New Books Network.
Prior to coming to Colgate, Professor Hall received his Ph.D. from Yale University and taught at the University of Toronto and Northern Arizona University. This fall he is teaching FSEM188: The American West and HIST400: The Arts of Resistance.