Gunther W. Peck | Scholars@Duke

Gunther W. Peck
Associate Professor of History

My research focuses on the long history of human trafficking and its relationship to the evolution of racial ideology, humanitarian intervention, and immigration policy in North America and Europe.

In addition to mentoring both History and Public Policy graduate students, I regularly teach four undergraduate lecture courses entitled “Immigrant Dreams, American Realities: U.S. Immigration Policy History,” “Historicizing Whiteness,” “Human Trafficking, Past to Present,” and “North American Environmental History.” As a community activist in North Carolina, I have also taken a keen interest in voting rights and understanding how and why citizens do and do not vote.

Current Appointments & Affiliations

Associate Professor of History, History, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences 2003
Associate Professor of Public Policy Studies, Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University 2003
Bass Fellow, History, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences 2011

Contact Information

308 Classroom Bldg, Durham, NC 27708
Dept of History, Box 90719, Durham, NC 27708-0719
peckgw@duke.edu (919) 684-3014

Background
Education, Training, & Certifications
- Ph.D., Yale University 1994
- M.A., Yale University 1991
- M.A., University of Wisconsin - Madison 1989
- B.A., Princeton University 1984
Previous Appointments & Affiliations
- Director of the Hart Leadership Program, Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University 2018 - 2022
- Fred W. Shaffer Associate Professor, History, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences 2006 - 2011
Recognition
In the News
- OCT 29, 2020
  
  Elections in a Pandemic
- OCT 26, 2020
  
  Voter Intimidation Is Real. Here's What You Can Do About It
- NOV 7, 2019 Sanford School of Public Policy
  
  Two New Endowed Professorships to Help Hart Program Develop Students for Careers in Public Life
- OCT 8, 2019
  
  How Immigration Detention Became a Government Headache
- NOV 8, 2018
  
  Election 2018: The Surprise Was There Were Few Surprises
- NOV 1, 2018 Sanford School Policy 360 podcast
  
  Making Voting Trendy with Parkland Student Leader
- OCT 4, 2018 Sanford School of Public Policy
  
  The Torch Passes at the Hart Leadership Program
- FEB 3, 2017 Duke University Medium
  
  Gunther Peck: How Clinton and the Democrats Lost North Carolina
- JUN 27, 2016 WRAL
  
  Duke professor: Immigration reform more symbolic than factual
- JUN 15, 2016 The News & Observer
  
  Gunther Peck comments: In Greensboro, Trump takes on Obama, Clinton, immigrants
- JUN 7, 2016 Salon
  
  Gunther Peck: The politics of bigotry -- Donald Trump and the rise of white racial victimhood
- APR 1, 2016
  
  C-SPAN Gets History Lesson In U.S. Refugee Policy
- MAR 17, 2016
  
  Did Casting a Ballot Just Get Harder?
- MAR 15, 2016 Duke Campaign Stop 2016
  
  Glad You Asked: Casting a Ballot Just Got Harder
- MAR 10, 2016
  
  Gunther Peck on Will New Voting Restrictions Curb Voter Participation?
- NOV 25, 2015 Raleigh News & Observer
  
  Accepting Syrian Refugees
- OCT 28, 2015
  
  Duke in Pictures: Teach-in Covers Challenges to Student Voting in 2016
- SEP 23, 2015
  
  ‘Hyphenated American’ Exhibit and Event at Duke Oct. 1
- NOV 13, 2014
  
  News Tip: Experts Can Comment on Obama's Immigration Plan
- JUL 8, 2014
  
  Tiffany Lieu: Drawn by the Connections of History
- AUG 12, 2013 Durham Herald-Sun
  
  Duke, UNC students speak out against N.C. voting legislation
Awards & Honors
Expertise
Subject Headings
Global Scholarship
- Expertise
  - United States of America (Country)
Research
Selected Grants
- Peck Visiting Associate Professor at Yale awarded by Yale University 2017 - 2018
Publications & Artistic Works
Selected Publications
- Books
  - Peck, G. W. Reinventing Free Labor: Padrones and Immigrant Workers in the North American West, 1885-1930. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
  - Peck, G. W. Trafficking in Race: White Slavery and the Rise of a Transatlantic Working Class, 1660-1860 (In Progress), n.d.
  - Peck, G. W. The Shadow of White Slavery: Innocence, Rescue, and Empire in Contemporary Human Trafficking Campaigns (In Progress), n.d.
- Academic Articles
  - Peck, G. “Labor abolition and the politics of white victimhood: Rethinking the history of working-class racism.” Journal of the Early Republic 39, no. 1 (March 1, 2019): 89–98. https://doi.org/10.1353/jer.2019.0007.
    Full Text
  - Peck, G. “Migrant labor and global commons: Transnational subjects, visions, and methods.” International Labor and Working Class History 85, no. 5 (March 24, 2014): 118–37. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0147547913000501.
    Full Text
  - Peck, Gunther. “The Nature of Labor: Fault Lines and Common Ground in Environmental and Labor History.” Environmental History 11 (April 2006): 212–38.
  - Peck, G. W. “White Slavery and Whiteness: A Transnational View of the Sources of Working-Class Radicalism and Racism.” Labor: Studies in Working Class History of the Americas 1, no. 2 (2004): 41–63.
  - Peck, G. W. “Contracting Coercion? Rethinking the Origins of Free Labor in the United States and Great Britian.” Buffalo Law Review 51, no. 1 (2003): 201–18.
  - Peck, G. W. “In Search of an American Working Class: Nationalist Fictions in the Making of Western Labor History.” Mitteilungsblatt Des Instituts Fur Soziale Bewegungen 25 (May 2001): 29–45.
  - Peck, G. W. “Padrones and Protest: "Old" Radicals and "New" Immigrants in Bingham, Utah, 1905-1912.” Western Historical Quarterly 24, no. 2 (May 1993): 157–78.
- Book Sections
  - Peck, G. “The shadow of white slavery: Race, innocence, and history in contemporary anti-human trafficking campaigns.” In The Power of the Past: History and Statecraft, 209–34, 2016.
  - Peck, G. W. “The Shadow of White Slavery: Race, Innocence, and History in Contemporary Anti-Human Trafficking Campaigns.” In The Power of the Past: History & Statecraft, edited by J. Suri, 232–60. Brookings, 2015.
  - Peck, G. “Feminizing White Slavery in the United States.” In Workers Across the Americas: The Transnational Turn in Labor History, 2011. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199731633.003.0017.
    Full Text
  - Peck, G. W. “Feminizing White Slavery in the United States: Marcus Braun and the Transnational Traffic in White Bodies, 1890-1910.” In Workers, the Nation State and Beyond, edited by L. Fink and J. Greene, 221–44. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
  - Peck, G. W. “Manly Gambles: The Politics of Risk on the Comstock Lode.” In Across the Great Divide: Cultures of Manhood in the U.S. West, edited by M. Basso, L. McCall, and D. Garceau, 73–96. London: Routledge, 2000.
  - Peck, G. W. “Mobilizing Community: Migrant Workers and the Politics of Labor Mobility in the North American West, 1900-1920.” In Labor Histories: Class, Politics, and the Working-Class Experience, edited by Eric Arnesen, Julie Greene, and Bruce Laurie, 175–200. Urbana, 1998.
  - Peck, G. W. “Padrones and Protest: "Old" Radicals and "New" Immigrants in Bingham, Utah, 1905-1912.” In Problems in the History of the American West, edited by C. Milner, A. Butler, and D. Lewis, 328–39. Heath, 1997.
  - Peck, G. W. “Padrones and Protest: "Old" Radicals and "New" Immigrants in Bingham, Utah, 1905-1912.” In A World We Thought We Knew: Readings in Utah History, edited by J. McCormick and J. Sillito, 154–72. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1995.
  - Peck, G. W. “Reinventing Free Labor: Immigrant Padrones and Contract Laborers in North America, 1885 - 1925 (forthcoming).” In The Workers’ West, edited by E. Jamesom and R. D. Myers. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, n.d.
  - Peck, G. W. “Movement Culture in Durham, North Carolina (forthcoming).” In TBD, edited by W. Hogan. Duke University Press, n.d.
- Other Articles
  - Peck, G. W. “Our Bipartisan Acceptance of Refugees.” The Atlanta Journal Constitution, November 26, 2015.
    Link to Item
  - Peck, G. W. “Accepting Syrian Refugees both Humanitarian and in Our National Interest.” Raleigh News and Observer, November 23, 2015.
    Link to Item
  - Peck, G. W. “Big Voter Turnouts and Perceptions of Fraud.” Duke University: Sanford School of Public Policy, June 9, 2011.
    Link to Item
  - Peck, G. W. “I Am Waiting.” Duke Chronicle, November 1, 2010.
    Link to Item
  - Peck, G. W. “Hillary Clinton and the Southern Strategy.” Duke Today, March 21, 2008.
    Link to Item
  - Peck, G. W. “"“Fighting the President’s Falsehoods about Immigration,” Raleigh News and Observer, 2/13/17.” Raleigh News and Observer, n.d.
    Link to Item
- Book Reviews
  - Peck, G. W. “Review of Anaconda: Labor, Community, and Culture in Montana's Smelter City by Laura Mercier.” Labor History (Us). Taylor & Francis (Routledge): SSH Titles, 2003.
  - Peck, G. W. “Review of Anaconda: Labor, Community, and Culture in Montana's Smelter City by Laura Mercier.” Labor History (Us). Taylor & Francis (Routledge): SSH Titles, 2003.
  - Peck, G. “Review of Industrial Cowboys: Miller & Lux and the Transformation of the Far West, 1850-1920 by David Igler.” The Journal of American History. Berkeley, 2002. https://doi.org/10.2307/3092410.
    Full Text
  - Peck, G. “Review of A New South Rebellion: The Battle against Convict Labor in the Tennessee Coalfields, 1871-1896 by Karin A. Shapiro.” The Jornal of Social History, October 2000.
  - Peck, G. W. “Review of Big Trouble: A Murder in a Small western Town sets off a Struggle for the Soul of America by J. Anthony Lukas.” The Western Historical Quarterly. Oxford University Press, 1999.
  - Peck, G. W. “Review of All that Glitters: Class, Conflict, and Community in Cripple Creek by Elizabeth Jameson.” The Western Historical Quarterly. Oxford University Press, 1999.
  - Peck, G. “Review of The Centralia Tragedy of 1919: Elmer Smith and the Wobblies by Tom Copeland.” The Western Historical Quarterly. Oxford University Press, 1994. https://doi.org/10.2307/970396.
    Full Text
Teaching & Mentoring
Recent Courses
Scholarly, Clinical, & Service Activities
Outreach & Engaged Scholarship
- Bass Connections Team Leader. Elections in a Pandemic: Looking Back, Looking Ahead. 2021 - 2022 2021 - 2022
- Bass Connections Team Leader. Elections in a Pandemic. 2020 2020

Some information on this profile has been compiled automatically from Duke databases and external sources. (Our About page explains how this works.) If you see a problem with the information, please write to Scholars@Duke and let us know. We will reply promptly.

Education, Training, & Certifications

Previous Appointments & Affiliations

In the News

Awards & Honors

Subject Headings

Global Scholarship

Expertise

Selected Grants

Selected Publications

Books

Academic Articles

Book Sections

Other Articles

Book Reviews

Recent Courses

Outreach & Engaged Scholarship