Deborah K. Fitzgerald
Dean Fitzgerald's most recent book, recipient of the Theodore Saloutos Prize
Deborah Fitzgerald is Kenan Sahin Dean of the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, and Professor of the History of Technology in the Program in Science, Technology, and Society.
Dean Fitzgerald received her B.A. from Iowa State University (History and English), and her PhD from the University of Pennsylvania (History and Sociology of Science). Prior to joining the MIT faculty in 1988, she was an Assistant Professor in the History of Science at Harvard University.
She is a recipient of the Provost's Fund Grant from MIT (1989), the Old Dominion Fellowship (1990-1991), a Mellon Foundation Grant, and National Science Foundation Fellowships for 1991 and 1996.
Dean Fitzgerald's research focuses on the industrialization of agriculture, particularly in 20th century America. Along with Harriet Ritvo, she is the co-organizer of the MIT Seminar in Environmental and Agricultural History. The Dean is also active in the Society for the History of Technology, and is the immediate past president of the Agricultural History Society.
That organization honored her in 2003 with the Theodore Saloutos Prize for best book of the year for Every Farm a Factory: The Industrial Ideal in American Agriculture (Yale University Press, 2003). She is also the author of The Business of Breeding: Hybrid Corn in Illinois, 1890-1940 (Cornell University Press, 1990).
Massachusetts Institute of Technology