Christopher Elias

Education & Professional History

Brown University, PhD

I was born and raised in Massachusetts. At Carleton, I teach a number of courses dealing with American cultural and political history, with a focus on issues of sexuality, gender, memory, immigration, and film.

My scholarship focuses on culture and identity in twentieth century America. I’ve written on a variety of topics, including 1950s gossip magazines, spirituality and gender in the work of filmmaker Terrence Malick, masculine nationalism in James Joyce’s fiction, and national identity in German war cemetery design. I also have interests in contemporary fiction, 20th century American art, the US War on Terror, and the history of Lebanon.

My first book, Gossip Men: J. Edgar Hoover, Joe McCarthy, Roy Cohn, and the Politics of Insinuation, was released in 2021 by the University of Chicago Press.

Gossip Men: J. Edgar Hoover, Joe McCarthy, Roy Cohn, and the Politics of Insinuation (University of Chicago Press, 2021)

“Gossip fosters intimacy and even saves lives, but keep it offline.” Psyche (September 23, 2021)

“The Art of Subtlety.” Air Mail (September 2, 2021).

“Joe McCarthy Comes Alive.” The Los Angeles Review of Books (August 2, 2020).

“Sons of God: Postwar Gender and Spirituality in Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life.” Film Criticism 44.1 (Jan. 2020).

“‘An American Hero’: The Right-Wing Reconstruction of Joseph McCarthy.” Contested Commemoration in U.S. History: Diverging Public Interpretations (Routledge Global Public History). Ed. Melissa M. Bender and Klara Stephanie Szlezák. London: Routledge, 2020: 94-111.

“Black Crosses: La Cambe German War Cemetery, Collective Trauma, and the Remaking of National Identity.” War and Memorials: The Second World War and Beyond. Ed. Frank Jacob and Kenneth Pearl. Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöeningh, 2019: 39-54.

“Muscular Christianity.” Reforming America: A Thematic Encyclopedia and Document Collection of the Progressive Era. Edited by Jeffrey A. Johnson. ABC-Clio, 2017: 442-444.

“Sexuality and the Modern American Gossip Magazine.” OutHistory.org (Mar. 2017).

“War Photography.” The Encyclopedia of War: Social Science Perspectives. Edited by Paul I. Joseph. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2017: 1834-1836.

“What Makes them Dubliners?: James Joyce’s ‘An Encounter’ and the Foundations of Masculinist Nationalism in Ireland.” The Journal of Men’s Studies 24.3 (Oct. 2016): 228-240.

“A Lavender Reading of J. Edgar Hoover.” Slate.com (Sept. 2015).