Randall McGowen

Office: 365 McKenzie Hall
Phone: (541) 346-4831
Email: rmcgowen@darkwing.uoregon.edu
On leave 2005-2006

Biographical Information

B.A. 1966-1970 at American University at Washington D.C.
M.A. 1970-1971 at University of Illinois at Urbana
Ph.D 1971-1979 at University of Illinois at Urbana
Professor, specializing in Modern Britain and India, University of Oregon since 1982

Major Publications

Co-author with Donna Andrew, The Perreaus and Mrs. Rudd: Forgery and Betrayal in Eighteenth-Century London (University of California Press, 2001).
"Managing the Gallows: The Bank of England and the Death Penalty, 1797-1821," Law and History Review, 2007, 241-82.
"Cruel Inflictions and the Claims of Humanity in Early-Nineteenth-Century England,"in Assaulting the Past: Placing Violence in Historical Context,
ed. Katherine Watson (Newcastle, 2007), 38-57.
"Making Examples' and the Crisis of Punishment in Mid-Eighteenth-Century England,"in The British and Their Laws in the Eighteenth Century,
ed. David Lemmings, (London, 2005), 182-205.
"The Bank of England and the Policing of Forgery, 1797-1821," Past and Present, 2005, 81-116.
"The Problem of Punishment in Eighteenth-Century England," in Penal Practice and Culture, 1500-1900, eds. S. Devereaux & P. Griffiths
(London, 2003), 210- 31.
"History, Culture, and the Death Penalty," Historical Reflections, 2003, 229-49.
"Making the Bloody Code? Forgery Legislation in Eighteenth-Century England," in Law, Crime, and English Society 1660-1840, ed. Norma Landau
(Cambridge, 2002), 117- 38.
"From Pillory to Gallows: The Punishment of Forgery in the Age of the Financial Revolution," Past and Present, 1999, 107-40.
"Knowing the Hand: Forgery and the Proof of Writing in Eighteenth-Century England," Historical Reflections, 1998, 385-414.
"Prison Reform in England, 1780-1865," Chapter III in the Oxford History of the Prison (New York, 1995), 79-109.
"Power and Humanity, or Foucault Among the Historians," in Reassessing Foucault, ed. Roy Porter and Colin Jones (London, 1994), 91-112.
"Civilizing Punishment: The End of the Public Execution in England," Journal of British Studies, 1994, 257-82.
"Forgery Discovered, or the Perils of Circulation in Eighteenth-Century England," Angelaki, 1993-94, 257-82.
"Punishing Violence, Sentencing Crime," in The Violence of Representation: Literature and the History of Violence, ed. N. Armstrong & L. Tennenhouse
(New York, 1989), 140-56.
"The Changing Face of God's Justice: The Debate Over Divine and Human Punishment in Eighteenth-Century England," Criminal Justice History,
1988, 63-98.
"'He Beareth Not the Sword in Vain': Religion and the Criminal Law in Eighteenth-Century England," Eighteenth-Century Studies, 1987-88, 192-211.
"The Body and Punishment in Eighteenth-Century England," Journal of Modern History, 1987, 651-79.
"The Image of Justice and Reform of the Criminal Law in Early Nineteenth- Century England," Buffalo Law Review, 1983, 89-125.

Awards and Honors

NEH Category "C" Fellowship, Brown University, 1980-81
American Bar Foundation Fellowship, Summer 1986
NEH Travel to Collection Grant, 1987
Chester Higby Prize 1987-88 (best article published in Journal of Modern History)
American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Fellowship, McMaster University, June 1993
Humanities Centre Fellowship, Australian National University, Winter 2001
Fellow, Oregon Humanities Center, Spring 2004
NEH Fellowship 2005-2006

Current Research and Writing

The death penalty and criminal law in 18th and 19th century Britain

Recent Teaching

Western Civilization
British History History of India
History of India
World History

Teaching Interests

Britain since 1500
Early Modern Europe
History of India