Introduction
Peter Nathaniel Stearns (born March 3, 1936) is a professor at George Mason University, where he was provost, from January 1, 2000 to July 2014.
Stearns was Chair of the Department of History at Carnegie Mellon University and also served as the Dean of the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences. In addition, he founded and edited the Journal of Social History. While at Carnegie Mellon he developed a pioneering approach to teaching World History.
Life
Besides his long career as a historian, he is active in historical groups such as the American Historical Society, the Society for French Historical Studies, the Social Science History Association and the International Society for Research on Emotion. He attended Harvard College and later received his Ph.D. from Harvard University.
In his prolific career as an author and editor, he has written or edited over 100 different books. Stearns once served as chair of the Advanced Placement World History committee.
Works
His books include:
- 1848: The Revolutionary Tide in Europe, Norton, 1974
- A Day in the Life
- American Behavioral History
- Battleground of Desire
- Cultures in Motion
- Documents in World History
- Emotion and Social Change
- Encyclopedia of European Social History
- The Encyclopedia of World History
- Global Outrage
- Knowing, Teaching, and Learning History: National and International Perspectives
- Lives of Labour: Work in a Maturing Industrial Society (1975)
- The Revolutions of 1848 (1974)
- World Civilizations
- World History in Brief
- World History: Patterns of Change and Continuity