Christopher Conz

Visiting Assistant Professor

Areas of Expertise

Africa, southern Africa, environmental history, health, disease, development, agriculture, migration

Education

Ph.D., Boston University
Headshot of Christopher Conz.

Courses

  • Global Environmental History
  • Histories of Disease and Healing
  • Gender and Power in African History
  • Sports, Society, and History
  • Early Africa to 1800
  • Modern Africa, 1800-Present

Research & Publications: 

Book: 

Environment, Knowledge, and Injustice in Lesotho: The Poverty of Progress. London: James Currey, 2024.

 

Multimedia Exhibit Essay: 

“Humanizing Migrants and Miners of Southern Africa (with Christina Balch),” Edge Effects, July 24, 2025.


Article Manuscripts:

“Narratives of Forced Removals and Environment in South Africa,” in progress for submission to Environmental History.

“Families, Personal Relationships, and Knowledge Production in African History,” in progress for submission to History in Africa.

 

Articles & Book Chapters:

“Stick to thy Hillock?: James Machobane and the Problem of Agroecology in Lesotho,” in Jane Carruthers, Nancy Jacobs, and Graeme Winn, eds., Environment, Power, and Justice: Southern African Histories (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2022).

“Sheep, Scab Mites, and Society: The Process and Politics of Veterinary Knowledge in Lesotho, Southern Africa, c. 1900-1933,” Environment and History 26.3 (2020): 383—412. *Winner ASEH Alice Hamilton Prize for best article.

“(Un)Cultivating the Disease of Maize: Pellagra, Policy, and Nutrition Practice in Lesotho, 1933-1963,” Journal of Southern African Studies 46.3 (2020): 509—526.

“Origins and Pathways of Agricultural Demonstration in Lesotho, Southern Africa, 1924-1960s,” Agricultural History 93.2 (2019): 233—263.