- Lecturer
Biography
Gracjan Kraszewski first started teaching in the SDC in the fall of 2019 and has taught the courses SDC 100, 250, and 350. His primary design interests lie in the intellectual history of modern and postmodern architecture, especially regarding the Great War’s (1914-1919) psychological effects on 20th century urban design and the abstract conceptualizations of post Y2K public installations. He is also interested in the intersection of nuclear energy with sustainable design concepts, the evolution of cathedral building in Europe from the Romanesque to Baroque periods (approx. 9-17th c.), and the built and natural environment of the Palouse.
He earned his PhD in history from Mississippi State University and taught in the history department at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign before coming to WSU (where he also teaches in the history department). He is the author of five books: a Civil War history entitled Catholic Confederates (The Kent State University Press, 2020), the novels Thermonuclear Mirth (Arouca Press, 2024), Seraphim and the Dust Plague (Arouca, 2024), and The Holdout (Adelaide Books, 2018), and the book of essays The Hippo Lectures (Arouca, 2023).Historical essays or reviews have appeared in The Journal of Southern History, The Polish Review, Catholic Historical Review, Church History Journal, American Catholic Studies, Idaho Magazine, and the Journal of Southern Religion.
He is fluent in English, Polish and French with ability in Russian, Italian, and Spanish. Between 2006-2013, he played baseball collegiately, professionally in Europe in the Czech Republic and Belgium, and for the Polish National Team. He is currently researching for a book that will be a comprehensive Great War history about people on the Palouse, tentatively entitled The Great War as Seen from the Palouse. He imagines this book will be ready for publication sometime in 2027. So too a hybrid half prose/half poetry novel, inspired by Dante’s Divine Comedy, called Bubba’s Purgatorio. Another fiction book—Mark and Anna: Former (?) Models: The Theology of Saint Augustine of Hippo via Postmodern Prose—is due out sometime in 202