Christopher S Rose

Welcome! I am Assistant Professor and Program Head of History at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio, Texas. I specialize in the social history of medicine, focusing on the nineteenth and twentieth century Middle East. I earned my Ph.D. in History from the University of Texas at Austin (UT) in 2019.

Before coming to OLLU, I taught at St Edward’s University in Austin, Texas, and in the Departments of History and Middle Eastern studies at UT-Austin.

I was a Fulbright scholar in Egypt in spring 2023, working on my monograph project Home Front Egypt: Famine, Disease, and Death during the Great War. The project explores how food policies employed during the war led to widespread malnutrition, which in turn facilitated the rapid spread of disease throughout the country, killing more people than military action. The ‘Spanish’ influenza pandemic alone claimed over 150,000 lives — over one percent of Egypt’s population — in the last two months of 1918. I published an article about the pandemic in Egypt in the Journal of World History.

In my relatively short teaching career, I have mentored students who have received a variety of accolades and awards, including Boren and Fulbright fellowships. I have also written a popular series of blog posts called the Grad School Survival Guide.

I am active as a public historian, and maintain an active media presence. I was co-host of the New Books in Middle Eastern Studies podcast channel, part of the New Books Network; as well as founding co-host of the 15 Minute History podcast for eight years.

I also have substantial experience in K-12 educator training, particularly working with world history and world geography educators. I have conducted numerous professional development sessions for educators, co-written several curriculum units for K-12 classrooms, and escorted numerous groups of educators to the Middle East.