Boston University History Professor Discusses His Recent U.S. Fulbright Scholarship
James Johnson Wins Fulbright Scholarship
Boston University history professor heads to Venice for research on Napoleon’s wars
Awardee
James Johnson
BU affiliation
Professor of history who just ended a three-year term as chair of the Boston University College of Arts & Sciences history department. He joined BU in 1990.
What is the honor you’ve received?
I have received the U.S. Fulbright Scholarship. I will spend my Fulbright Scholarship in Italy, where I will be affiliated with Università Ca’ Foscari, in Venice. The official term and affiliation with Ca’ Foscari University is for three months, from October through December, and I’ll be abroad, again in Venice, from May through July, reading, writing, and researching for a full year.
Why was this recognition given?
This is a research scholarship. I will spend time in the city’s libraries and archives working on a book about Napoleon’s wars in northern Italy in the 1790s, which culminated in the forced surrender of the Venetian Republic. The loss ended 1,000 years of proud independence for the city. It’s the story of an authoritarian who promised democracy to win public support before delivering Venice to Austria, which enforced military rule there for the next six decades.
Why is it meaningful?
“The Fulbright Scholarship is an immense honor, and I feel especially privileged to receive it at a time when so many sources of funding for academic research are being cut. This is for me an extra incentive to do what I can to make the most of this opportunity.”
What’s next?
My thoughts keep circling around two books that I’d like to write. One is an account of Oklahoma that tells the history I never learned when I was growing up there, including the fate of displaced Indigenous peoples there, its many all-Black towns and the Tulsa race massacre, and my great-grandparents’ experience during the Land Run of 1891. The other is a book about an extraordinary work for piano from the last years of Beethoven’s life, the Diabelli Variations.
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