Faculty/Staff Directory
Dr. Susan Asbury
Assistant Professor
Department of History and Political Science
Phone: 478-471-2982
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| Office Hours: | Spring 2025: In-person office hours: Mondays and Wednesdays 9:30 a.m. -- 10:30 a.m. Virtual office hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays 10:30 a.m. -- 11:30 a.m. (link in class syllabus) |
| Biography: | Susan Asbury holds a Ph.D. in American Studies from The Pennsylvania State University at Harrisburg. She completed a B.A. in History at Berry College and an M.A. in Public History at the University of South Carolina. For nearly ten years, Asbury worked in the museum field as a curator, museum educator, and administrator. Her research interests are in material culture, public history, U.S. history, consumerism, the intersections of popular culture and folklore studies, and social history. She has written articles, book chapters, blogs, and encyclopedia entries on her research. Asbury discovered her interest in the material culture of play while working as associate curator at The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, and is currently working on her book, Family Game Night: Board Games, Play, Memory, and Culture in Victorian America, that focuses on the early decades of the American board game industry. The book will be published in 2025. I am delighted to be at MGA! |
| Courses: | HIST 2111 -- US Survey to 1865 HIST 2112 -- US Survey 1865-present HIST 3010 -- Introduction to Public History HIST 3011 -- Museum Studies HIST 3012 -- American Architecture and Historic Preservation HIST 4100 -- Material Culture Studies |
| Education: | Ph.D., American Studies, Penn State University, Harrisburg M.A. Public History, University of South Carolina McKissick Museum Certificate in Museum Management, University of South Carolina B.A., History, Berry College |
| Awards and Honors: | Georgia College and State University “Thank-a-teacher” award recipient, fall 2021 G. Rollie Adams Research Fellowship and Mary Valentine and Andrew Cosman Research Fellowships, The Strong, summer 2017 Penn State Harrisburg American Studies Dissertation Research Travel Fund recipient, summer 2017 Student Life Division Award, “Positively Restless,” Elizabethtown College, 2015-2016 Emerging Scholars Mentor, Elizabethtown College, 2015 Carole Isaac Nexus Award for the Student Development Learning Communities, Student Life Division Award, Elizabethtown College, 2011-2012 National Council on Public History (NCPH) Student Project Award, 2000 |
| Publications: | Family Game Night: Board Games, Play, Memory, and Culture in Victorian America. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, Fall 2025. "'Remember the Maine!:' The Spanish-American War Invades the Parlor." Board Game Academics, Vol. 1 Issue 1 (Spring 2024): https://boardgameacademics.com/remember-the-maine-the-spanish-american-war-invades-the-parlor/. “Why is Barbie Such a Cultural Phenomenon?” MGA Faculty Q&A, July 27, 2023. https://www.mga.edu/news/2023/07/faculty-QandA-why-is-barbie-such-a-cultural-phenomenon.php?fbclid=IwAR1osKkEVppe_SbMdw-Dy3BwdENFTNhUZ1blvq61WJ6F_RbMtBtmr2EKaIE. “A Plethora of Games for a Splendid Little War: Parker Brothers Invade the Parlor,” blog for The Strong, spring 2018. https://www.museumofplay.org/blog/play-stuff/2018/03/a-plethora-of-games-for-a-splendid-little-war-parker-brothers-invades-the. Book review of It’s All a Game: The History of Board Games from Monopoly to Settlers of Catan, by Tristan Donovan. New York: Alfred Dunne Books, 2017, American Journal of Play, Vol. 10, No. 2, winter 2018: 230-232. “Serious Fun: A ‘Strong’ Model for Play and Folklore in Children’s Museums,” chapter in Folklife and Museums: 21st Century Perspectives. C. Kurt Dewhurst, Patricia Hall, Charlie Seemann, editors. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2017. Educational Program document for Threads exhibit, Governor’s Mansion, Harrisburg, February 2016-May 2016. “The Checkered Game of Life: Depictions of the Life Cycle in Board Games,” Midwestern Folklore Vol. 41, No. 2, fall 2015: 3-19. “Children’s Museums,” and “Dolls” entries for Encyclopedia of Youth Cultures in America. Simon Bronner and Cindy Dell Clark, editors. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Press, 2016. Book review of Barbie and Ruth: The Story of the World’s Most Famous Doll and the Woman Who Created Her, by Robin Gerber. New York: Collins Business, 2009, American Journal of Play, Vol. 2, No. 3, winter 2010: 380-382. “Calling All Barbie Playsets!,” “So Many Careers, So Little Time,” and “OMG! It’s NKOTB!,” blogs for The Strong (written between December 2008 and June 2009). “‘Simple Colonial Furniture:’ Franklin H. Gottshall’s Influence on Interior Design at Berry College,” with Laura Caldwell Anderson, in Georgia Inside & Out: Architecture, Landscape, and Decorative Arts. Athens: Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia, 2003. Foreword to Miracle in the Mountains by Harnett T. Kane with Inez Henry. Garden City, New York: Double Day and Co., 1956, fall 2002. |
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