Dr. Doug Harvey, adjunct associate professor, history, recently had his book, The Theater of Empire: Frontier Performances in America, 1750-1860, published by Pickering & Chatto Publishers, London. The Theater of Empire looks at how the new American Republic adapted an attitude of imperial expansionism as it crossed the Appalachians, appropriating land and resources.

Based on an assumption of Anglo-Saxon supremacy, English-speaking people in the new nation saw it as “good and right” to displace Indians and enslave blacks. Harvey’s book contends that theater – the stock theater plays of the day, including blackface minstrels and so-called “red-face” performances (whites caricaturing blacks and Indians onstage) – worked as propaganda to shape public opinion.

“I have always had an interest in mythology and assumptions, things we believe and we don’t even know why. That is what got me interested in writing this book,” Harvey said. “One of the assumptions among the general population of the new republic was that America should expand.”

Harvey first introduced his study of colonial and early American theater in his dissertation at the University of Kansas. His 2010 book, however, adds materials about Native American and African-American performances, providing an enlightening comparison of entertainment from the same time period.

“It contrasts the indigenous performances of sustainable cultures with the land hunger and exploitation of a colonial culture,” Harvey said.

Sitting in his JCCC office, Harvey says that 1760-1860 American theater played the same role as 21st century radio and television does today in support of U.S. military presence in foreign countries.

“The U.S. has something like 700 military and diplomatic missions in more than 100 countries. That’s an empire. The media fosters the idea of empire today like theater did in the past.”

Being a writer is Harvey’s calling. But that is only one of his areas of expertise.

Harvey worked in construction until age 32 when he began studies at Missouri State University, earning a double major in music and history in 1995. He received a master’s degree in history from Wichita State University, where his thesis was a history of the Cheyenne Bottoms wildlife area. For his doctorate at KU, he turned from environmental to cultural history and explored the expansion of the American frontier – a period traditionally dealt with by political, economic and military historians.

Harvey maintains his interest in music and is a founding member of the band Rowan, a Celtic and world music trio based in Lawrence for 12 years.

As an adjunct in JCCC U.S. history classes for more than five years and a lecturer at KU, Harvey says he has found balance in his life teaching, enjoying music and writing. He is currently working on three major projects ­ a historical monograph of the Whiskey Rebellion illustrated by two bande dessinée (French cartoons) artists, a screenplay version of the Whiskey Rebellion and a biography of Sol Smith, an itinerant theater manager, actor and lawyer based in St. Louis who traveled in the Trans-Appalachian West from 1815-1868.

Harvey is a true interdisciplinarian whose writing and teaching cuts across history, anthropology and performance.

“In the classroom, I try to present history from many points of view.”