Woods Named Distinguished Professor in Humanities
Michael Woods, professor in the UT Department of History, has been named a Distinguished Professor in Humanities. Woods has been on faculty at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, since August of 2020, and also serves as the director of the Andrew Jackson Papers.
Woods’ research focuses on the early republic and antebellum U.S. Civil War era. He has conducted extensive research on the political and cultural landscape of the 19th-century United States, particularly the partisanship, slavery, and sectionalism. His most recent book, Arguing until Doomsday: Stephen Douglas, Jefferson Davis, and the Struggle for American Democracy, was published in 2020. It analyzes the conflict between the two democrats and how they influenced the antebellum Democratic party in the mid-1850s.
The Papers of Andrew Jackson, directed by Woods, is a project sponsored by the College of Arts and Sciences, aiming to collect and publish all of Jackson’s literary works. This project has received multiple grants, including from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, the Tennessee Historical Commission, and the Tennessee Historical Society, and has produced 12 volumes so far.
Woods also recently completed a book-length study of John H. Van Evrie, a mid-19th century proslavery writer, titled The Business of Bigotry: John Van Evrie’s Nineteenth-Century Racist Media Empire which will be released by the University of North Carolina Press in September 2026. He teaches undergraduate courses on his specialties as well.
Distinguished Professors in Humanities at UT are faculty recognized for their exceptional contributions to teaching, research, and academia who demonstrate academic excellence, leadership, and a significant impact on their field of study. Understanding the partisanship and conflict of the antebellum U.S. Civil War era and its impact on our culture now is made easier by Woods’ continuous commitment to his study.
by Sloan Docekal