Smithsonian Journeys Experts

Thomas Emmert, professor emeritus at Gustavus Adolphus College, is a historian of Central and Eastern Europe with a research focus on the former Yugoslavia. Professor Emmert has also had visiting appointments at the University of Zagreb, the University of Minnesota, and Stanford University. He received his B.A. in history from St. Olaf College and his Ph.D. in Balkan and Russian history from Stanford University. A member of Phi Beta Kappa, he has been awarded research fellowships from the Fulbright Program, the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and the National Council for Eurasian and East European Research. His publications include Serbian Golgotha: Kosovo, 1389 (1990) and, most recently, The Scholars' Initiative: Confronting the Yugoslav Controversies (2009), a collaborative project of scholars from around the world dedicated to providing an objective analysis of what happened to Yugoslavia at the end of the 20th century. Professor Emmert has taught American undergraduates in semester programs in Zagreb and Berlin and has accompanied several educational trips to southeastern Europe.