Michael Adas


Michael Adas is an American historian and currently the Abraham E. Voorhees Professor of History at Rutgers University. He specializes in the history of technology, the history of anticolonialism and in global history.

Background

Michael Adas was born in 1943 to Harold A., and Elizabeth Rivard Adas. He attended Western Michigan University, where he graduated summa cum laude in 1965. He then went to the University of Wisconsin - Madison for his graduate schooling where he earned two M.A. degrees, History and Indian Studies, as well as his Ph.D in 1971. In the same year that he earned his M.A. degree in Indian studies he married Jane Hampton on June 18, 1967.
In 1971, Adas joined Rutgers University as an Assistant Professor and steadily rose through the ranks, becoming a full Professor in 1978. In 1996, Michael Adas received dual honors and was promoted to Rutgers University Board of Governors' Professor and received the Abraham E. Voorhees Chair in History. In addition, Michael Adas is a member of the Association for Asian Studies and the American Association of History Professors.

Awards

At Rutgers University, Adas won the John Simon Guggenheim Fellow Award in 1984 and the Warren Susman Teaching Award in 1987. He won the NJ-NEH Book Award in 1990, and the Dexter Prize in 1991 for Machines as the Measure of Men. In 1992, he won the Teacher of the Year Award.

Career timeline