Meet the Speaker Dr. Michael S. Martin, Professor of History at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette

Dr. Michael S. Martin, professor of history and department head for History, Geography, and Philosophy, researches, teaches, and writes about Louisiana history, public history, and the history of the U.S. South. He is a contributing faculty member of the Guilbeau Center for Public History and an affiliated faculty member of the Kathleen Babineaux Blanco Center for Public Policy. His most recent book is a work of public history, The University of Louisiana at Lafayette (2025), co-authored with Dr. Zachary Stein. Martin's publications include Firsthand Louisiana: Primary Sources in the History of the State (as co-editor, 2020), Rethinking New Acadia: Recent Essays on the Acadian Dispersal and Arrival in Louisiana (as editor, 2019); The Louisiana Experience (as co-author, 2017), Shackles of Memory: Creolization in the French Americas (as co-editor, 2015); Russell Long: A Life in Politics (2014), Louisiana Legacies: Readings in the History of the Pelican State (as co-editor, 2013), Louisiana Beyond Black and White: Recent Inter­pre­ta­tions of Twentieth-Century Race and Race Relations (as editor, 2011) and Historic Lafayette (2007). He serves as managing editor of the quarterly journal Louisiana History, the state's historical journal, is a fellow of the Louisiana Historical Association, and is a lifetime fellow of the Center for Louisiana Studies.