Jonathan van Harmelen

(he/him/his)

Visiting Assistant Professor of History

Areas of Study

History

Biography

Jonathan van Harmelen is a historian of 20th-century U.S. history. A specialist in the history of civil rights and the federal government, his research focuses on topics such as immigration, social movements, and transnational history. He is also a public historian who contributes to various online blogs and news outlets, and has worked with museums such as the Smithsonian and the Japanese American National Museum.

He frequently writes about topics related to Asian American history, and since 2019, he has been a columnist for the Japanese American National Museum’s publication Discover Nikkei. You can learn more about his work on his website.

Fall 2025

We the People: A History of American Political Movements, 1800-2020 — HIST 259

A More Perfect Union: Race and the Federal Government, 1876-2020 — HIST 387

Spring 2026

American History 1877-Present — HIST 104

Immigration in U.S. History — HIST 256

A History of Disinformation — HIST 446

Books

Greg Robinson with Jonathan van Harmelen, The Unknown Great. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2024.

Articles

“Nowhere to Go: Quarantine Orders, Epidemiology, and the Wartime Incarceration of Japanese Americans.” Pacific Historical Review, vol. 93, no. 4 (Autumn 2024). Winner of the 2025 Pacific Historical Review’s W. Turrentine Jackson Prize.
“A Circus in Tulare: Alfred J. Elliott, Congressional Orders, and Japanese Americans during World War II.” California History, vol. 102, no. 1 (Winter 2025), pp. 24-43.
“Lessons from a Different Shore: Portrayals of Japanese American Incarceration and The Redress Movement by Western European Newspapers.” Journal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, no. 1, (Fall 2021).
“The Scientist and the Shrub: Manzanar’s Guayule Project and Incarcerated Japanese American Scientists.” Southern California Quarterly, vol. 103, no. 1 (Spring, 2021), 61 - 98.