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Alden H. Young
Department of History and Politics
Drexel University
3141 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
(215) 895-2000
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Appointments:
Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA
(January 2015—present)
Assistant Professor of History and Politics and Director of the Program in
Africana Studies
University of Pennsylvania. Philadelphia, PA
2013-2015
Dean’s Mellon Postdoctoral Teaching Fellow
Department of Africana Studies
Education:
Princeton University. Princeton, NJ. Ph.D 2013
Adviser Robert L. Tignor
Committee Members Emmanuel Kreike, Jeremy Adelman and Mary S.
Morgan
Dissertation: Accounting for Decolonization: The Origins of the Sudanese
Economy, 1945-1964
Major Fields: Modern African and Middle Eastern History
Minor Field: Pre-colonial African History
University of Khartoum, Khartoum, Sudan. 2008-2009
Visiting Researcher, Development Studies and Research Institute
London School of Economics. London UK. 2004-2005
M.A. The History of International Relations.
Thesis: The “Jordan First” Slogan, National Identity and Political Legitimacy
Columbia University. NY, NY. 2000-2004
B.A. International and American History
Thesis: Egypt and the Diplomacy of Tourism, 1952-1959
American University of Cairo. Cairo, Egypt. 2003
Cranbrook-Kingswood. Detroit, Michigan. 1997-2000
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Teaching Experience:
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University of Pennsylvania
Spring 2014—Upper Level Seminar “Africa and the Middle East,” Department of
History
Fall 2013—Graduate Seminar “History of African Political Economy,” Department
of Africana Studies
Princeton University
Spring 2013—Teaching Assistant for course “Europe and the Modern World,” David
Cannadine
Spring 2013—Teaching Assistant for course “The World of Late Antiquity,” Jack
Tannous
Fall 2012—Teaching Assistant for course “The Making of the Modern Middle East,”
Max Weiss
Spring 2012—Teaching Assistant for course “A History of Latin America Since
1800,” Jeremy Adelman
Spring 2011—Teaching Assistant for course “A History of the World Since 1300,”
Jeremy Adelman and Stephen Kotkin
Fall 2010—Teaching Assistant for course “The United States and the World, “ with
Bradley Simpson
Spring 2010—Teaching Assistant for course “Southern African History,” with
Emmanuel Kreike
Boston University
Fall 2012—Guest Lecturer for “The International Relations of Africa,” Department of
International Relations
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Presentations
“Planning in Prose versus Planning with Numbers: Decolonization and the AngloEgyptian Sudan, 1946-1954,” African Studies Association, Baltimore, MD, November
21-24, 2013
Co-Chair of “Histories of Development Planning I: Regional, National and TransNational Perspectives” and “Histories of Development Planning II: Development
Projects in Perspective,” African Studies Association, Baltimore, MD, November 2124, 2013
“Designing New Economies: Economic Planning and the Construction of the
Sudanese State, 1945-1967,” Measurement, Planning and the State in Sub-Saharan
Africa: Historical Perspectives, Simone Fraiser University, Vancouver, Canada, April
19 2013
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“Designing New Economies: Economic Planning and the Construction of the
Sudanese State, 1945-1967,” Planning and Measurement in African Development:
CAS@50: Cutting Edges and Retrospectives, Centre for African Studies at the
University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, June 6-8 2012
“The Various Geographies of the Sudanese Economy,” Mapping Colonial and
Postcolonial Administrations, Sites of Modernity, MESAAS Columbia University
Graduate Student Conference, New York City, March 1-2, 2012
“Defining the Boundaries of the Sudanese Economy: A New Currency and Economic
Survey,” Indaba African Studies Lecture Series, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ.,
February 22, 2012
“Sudanese Development and the Cold War,” Parties, Pacts and Policies: The Middle
East and the Cold War, Middle Eastern Studies Association, Washington, DC.,
December 4, 2011
“Making a New Economy: The Sudanese Experience of Decolonization,” Fellows’
Seminar in the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, Princeton,
NJ., November 10, 2011
“Social Welfare or the Market: Postwar Economic Planning in Sudan, 1946-1951,”
Implementing Development, Empire and Development Conference, Department of
History at the University of York, July 2, 2011
“Nationalizing Economic Planning: Sudan's Experience with Development, 19451960,” Colonialism and Imperialism Workshop, The Princeton History Department,
Princeton University, Princeton, NJ. May 4, 2011
“Sudan after Empire: Planning for Development,” Indaba: The Program in African
Studies at Princeton University, Princeton, NJ. February 16th, 2011
“Budgets and Bureaucrats: The Struggle to Control Sudan’s Agricultural Schemes,
1954-1964,” African Studies Association, San Francisco, CA. November 26th, 2010
“The Political Consequences of Economic Development: The Relationship between a
Strategy for Economic Growth and Parliamentary Politics, 1954-1958” The African
Studies Association of the United Kingdom, St. Antony’s, Oxford, UK. September 17th,
2010
“Sudanese Economic Management in the Context of the Cold War: 1954-1959,“
International Graduate Conference on the Cold War, George Washington University,
April 24th, 2010
“Diagnosing Pathologies: Sudanese Policy-Makers and the Creation of
Economic Problems: 1954-1959.” Princeton University, Black History Month
Symposium, February 26th, 2010
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“Different Masters, but the Same Economy? An examination of Sudan’s Economic
Policies in the 1950s.” Khartoum Student Seminar Series, Khartoum, Sudan. March
24th, 2009
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Publications
Peer Reviewed
“Measuring the Sudanese Economy: A Focus on National Growth Rates and a Blindness
to Regional Inequality, 1958 to 1964” Canadian Journal of Development Studies (April
1, 2014): 44-60.
“The Anglo-Egyptian Rivalry, the Cold War and Economic Development in
Sudan:1954-1958,” in Massimiliano Trentin and Matteo Gerlini, (eds.) The Middle
East and the Global Cold War. (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Press,
April 2012): 29-53.
“The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and the Rise of the ‘Territorial Perspective’ in
Government Policymaking,” work in progress
co-authored with Mike Woldemariam, “Allies after Stalemate, Enemies after Victory:
Lessons from the Partitions of Ethiopia/Eritrea and Sudan/South Sudan” work in
progress
Non-Peer Reviewed Publications and Reviews
“Are Statistics Useless? The Four Phases of the African State in the 20th Century,” a
review of Morten Jerven’s Poor Numbers: How We Are Misled By African Development
Statistics and What to Do About It? (Cornell University Press, 2013)
(http://www.booksandideas.net/Are-Statistics-Useless-2476.html) [November 12,
2013]
“Sudan Shifts Alliance from Egypt to Ethiopia Over Nile Water Dispute,” Al-Monitor
(October 7, 2013) http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/10/sudanegypt-alliance-nile-ethiopia.html
“Malcolm X and the Search for the Universality of Blackness,” a review of Manning
Marables, Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention (New York, NY: Viking Press, 2011)
(http://www.booksandideas.net/Malcolm-X-and-the-Search-for-the.html)
[December 13, 2012]
“Energy, A Lens on World Politics,” a review of Daniel Yergin. The Quest: Energy,
Security and the Remaking of the Modern World. (London, UK: Allen Lane, 2011)
Books and Ideas (www.booksandideas.net/Energy-a-Lens-on-WorldPolitics.html?lang=fr) [September 14, 2012]
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Ghislaine Lydon. On Trans-Saharan Trails: Islamic Law, Trade Networks, and CrossCultural Exchange in Nineteenth-Century Western Africa. (New York, NY: Cambridge
University Press, 2009), Books and Ideas (http://www.booksandideas.net/A-VeryLively-Desert.html) [October 19, 2011]
Janice Boddy, Civilizing Women: British Crusades in Colonial Sudan. (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 2007), Africa: Journal of the International African
Institute (78-4) 2008.
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Fellowships and Grants:
Ninth International Seminar on Decolonization awarded by the National History
Center, the American Historical Association, and the John W. Kluge Center of the
Library of Congress (Summer 2014)
PIIRS Dissertation Writing Fellowship awarded by the Princeton Institute for
International and Regional Studies (2011-2012)
CAAS Dissertation Grant awarded by the Center for African American Studies,
Princeton University (2009)
History Department Dissertation Research Grant awarded by the History
Department of Princeton University (2008)
PIIRS Dissertation Research Grant awarded by the Princeton Institute for
International Studies, Princeton University (2008)
Fulbright-Hays Critical Language Grant awarded by the University of
Yarmouk/University of Virginia Summer Language Institute, Yarmouk Univeristy,
Irbid, Jordan (2006)
NES Language Fellowship awarded by the Department of Near Eastern Studies,
Princeton University (Arabic Language) (2006)
PIIRS Summer Language Fellowship awarded by Princeton Institute for
International Studies, Princeton University (Arabic language) (2006)
Presidential Fellowship awarded by the Graduate School of Princeton University
(2005-2010)
Davis Center Grant awarded by the Princeton History Department and Shelby C.
Davis Center for Historical Scholarship (2005-2010)
John Kluge Summer Research Grant awarded by the Office of Scholarships and
Fellowships, Columbia University (2003)
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Professional Service
Convener of the Book Proposal Writing Workshop in the Department of Africana
(2014)
Examiner for the W. E. B. Dubois Undergraduate Prize in Africana Studies
Co-Organizer of the Department of Africana’s Professional Development Workshop
(2013-2014)
Alternate member of the Graduate Assistant Search in the Department of History,
Princeton University (2013)
Coordinating Committee for Thingira: The Graduate Student Organizing Committee
for African Studies at Princeton. (2011-2012)
Referee for the History of Political Economy (2011)
Lead graduate student convener of the African History Job Search at the Department
of History, Princeton University (2007)
Executive Board Member of the Princeton Black Graduate Caucus. (2006-2007)
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Professional Associations
African Studies Association, Middle Eastern Studies Association, Sudan Studies
Association, the American Historical Association, American Political Science
Association
Hobbies
Wilderness Leader for freshman orientation program (COHOP) Columbia University
2001-2004
Senior year wilderness leader for sophomore students Cranbrook Kingswood
School (2000)
Club Rugby team member Columbia University (2000-2003)
Figure Painting
Languages
Arabic (fluent) and French (intermediate)
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References
Robert Tignor
Rosengarten Professor of Modern and Contemporary History, Emeritus. Lecturer
with the rank of Professor in History
Princeton University
Dickinson Hall, Rm 129
Princeton, NJ 08544
609-258-8905
rltignor@princeton.edu
Emmanuel Kreike
Professor of History
Princeton University
Dickinson Hall, Rm 129
Princeton, NJ 08544
609-258-4155
kreike@princeton.edu
Mary S. Morgan
Professor of History and Philosophy of Economics
London School of Economics and Political Science
Department of Economic History
Houghton Street,
London WC2A 2AE, UK.
Tel -44-207-955-7081
m.morgan@lse.ac.uk
Jeremy Adelman
Walter Samuel Carpenter III Professor of Spanish Civilization and Culture
Princeton University
Dickinson, Rm 129
Princeton, NJ 08544
609-258-7550
adelman@princeton.edu
Eve Troutt Powell
Professor of History
SAS Associate Dean for Graduate Studies
University of Pennsylvania
College Hall 208
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6379
215 898.3518
troutt@sas.upenn.edu
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