Core Faculty & Staff 2015

Alice Nash

Alice Nash is Associate Professor of History at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and was the director of the UMass Certificate Program in Native American & Indigenous Studies. She is also a member of the Advisory Board of the American Indian Law Alliance and an ally of the Global Indigenous Women’s Caucus of the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. She earned her Ph.D. in History from Columbia University (1997) where her doctoral research focused on the impact of gender and colonization on Wabanaki families in the Northeast. She has published numerous articles on northeastern Native American history including three in French translation in the leading Quebec journal Recherches amérindiennes au Québec. With Christoph Strobel, she co-authored Daily Life of Native Americans from Post-Columbian through Nineteenth Century America (Greenwood, 2006). In 2003-2004 she held the first Fulbright-Université de Montréal Distinguished Chair, during which time she taught a course on the Deerfield Raid of 1704 to Canadian students and brought them to Deerfield for the Tercentenary of the Raid on February 29, 2004. She has worked with K-12 teachers since her arrival at UMass Amherst in 1999, including as co-director with Neal Salisbury of the 2013 NEH Summer Institute for K-12 Teachers, Native Americans of New Enland: A Historical Overview.

D. Rae Gould

Rae Gould (Nipmuc), Native American Program Specialist, Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, Washington, DC. She was lecturer and Repatriation Coordinator at the department of Anthropology, University of Amherst (2011-2014). She is the author of “The Nipmuc Nation, Federal Acknowledgment, and a Case of Mistaken Identity,” in Amy Den Ouden and Jean O’Brien (eds.), Recognition, Sovereignty Struggles and Indigenous Rights in the United States: A Sourcebook (University of North Carolina Press, 2013); “Indigenous Archaeology and Being Indian in New England,” in George Nicholas (ed.), Being and Becoming Indigenous Archaeologists (Left Coast Press), 2010. She has been interviewed by the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation regarding her involvement in the Native American field.

Neal Salisbury

Neal Salisbury is the Barbara Richmond 1940 Professor Emeritus in the Social Sciences at Smith College. He has been a key player in the expansion of American Indian history as an academic field. He specializes in colonial-revolutionary North American history and Native American history. His scholarly interests center on indigenous Americans, particularly in the Northeast between 1500 and 1800. Salisbury's publications include Manitou and Providence: Indians, Europeans, and the Making of New England, 1500-1643 (Oxford, 1982); an edition of Mary Rowlandson: The Sovereignty and Goodness of God (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1997; originally published in 1682) with related documents; two volumes of essays, A Companion to American Indian History, edited with Philip J. Deloria (Blackwell, 2002), and Reinterpreting New England Indians and the Colonial Experience, edited with Colin G. Calloway (Colonial Society of Massachusetts, 2003). He is the co-author of two textbooks: The Enduring Vision: A History of the American People, Volume 1: To 1877 (Wadsworth Cengage, 8th ed., 2013), and The People: A History of Native America (Wadsworth Cengage, 2007). Over the past quarter century, Salisbury has participated in several dozen workshops and Institutes for K-12 teachers, four of which were funded by NEH. He has served as Project Director for three Summer Institutes including The American Revolution and American Peoples: A Comparative Inquiry, funded by NEH in 2001-2002. He served as co-director with Alice Nash of the 2013 NEH Summer Institute, Native Americans of New England: A Historical Overview.

Kelley Brown

Kelley Brown has taught history and politics at Easthampton High School since 2001, where she also serves as the school’s Coordinator of Professional Development. She is a consultant and trainer in social studies instruction, curricular development, historical thinking skills, Common Core integration, and creative instruction in both Massachusetts and Vermont. Brown has also worked with the Collaborative for Educational Services since 2006 to facilitate professional development and design curriculum for the Emerging America: Teaching American History (TAH) Program and for Massachusetts Department of Youth Services educators. Brown worked previously with Alice Nash and Neal Salisbury on several TAH projects. Brown was a Disney Teacher of the Year recipient in 2006, the Massachusetts “Preserve America” History Teacher of the Year in 2010, and a Ronald McDonald House Charities “Local Hero” Award recipient in 2011.

Adeline Broussan

Institute coordinator Adeline Broussan is a PhD student at UMass Amherst. She studies the history of women in the Vietnam War. She graduated from University of Toulouse-Jean Jaurès where she also completed her masters. She previously taught social studies and French language arts for five years at the French American School of Rhode Island. She also coordinated the middle school for one year.

Vincenza Parella

Vincenza Parella, the project assistant, graduated from UMass Amherst in 2015 with a degree in Journalism and a certificate in Native American Indian Studies. She is very passionate about using story telling to communicate messages that might not otherwise be heard, whether through print, social or multimedia. She has worked on the Massachusetts Native Trails Project with Dr. Jean Forward and managed communications for the Native Americans of New England institute as well as helped develop this website. While at UMass Amherst she received a ceremonial blanket for her dedication to the Native American Indian department. Vincenza is also part Aquinnah Wampanoag, one of the tribes in New England.