Rate My Professor Robert Snyder

Robert Snyder is a distinguished historian and Professor Emeritus of Journalism and American Studies in the History faculty at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey-Newark, where he served from 2000 until his retirement on July 1, 2020. He earned a BA in 1977 from Livingston College at Rutgers University-New Brunswick, majoring in History and Urban Communications, and a PhD in American History from New York University. Snyder directed the Journalism program in Rutgers-Newark’s Department of Arts, Culture and Media from 2000 to 2005 and the Graduate Program in American Studies from 2009 to 2014. Earlier in his career, he worked as a journalist for New York Newsday, WNET/PBS, More magazine, and the Tarrytown Daily News, and served as a senior research consultant for Ric Burns’ PBS series New York: A Documentary Film, which aired starting in 1999. He also taught at Princeton University and was editor of Media Studies Journal.

Snyder’s research focuses on New York City history, urban life, immigration, workers, popular culture, and public history. His key publications include Crossing Broadway: Washington Heights and the Promise of New York City (Cornell University Press, 2014), The Voice of the City: Vaudeville and Popular Culture in New York (Ivan R. Dee), Transit Talk: New York’s Bus and Subway Workers Tell Their Stories (Rutgers University Press, 1998), Metropolitan Lives: The Ashcan Artists and Their New York (co-authored, Norton/Smithsonian, winner of the College Art Association’s Barr Prize), and All the Nations Under Heaven: Immigrants, Migrants, and the Making of New York (co-authored, revised edition, Columbia University Press, 2019). He has published scholarly articles in the Journal of Urban History, Journal of American History, Journalism, and Reviews in American History, as well as pieces in The New York Times, The Nation, Columbia Journalism Review, and The Star-Ledger. Snyder co-curated the Smithsonian exhibit for Metropolitan Lives, produced the award-winning documentary City Kids Meet Ashcan Art (Gold Apple, National Educational Media Network), and consulted for NPR’s Peabody Award-winning Sonic Memorial project. Appointed Manhattan Borough Historian in November 2019, he served as a Fulbright Scholar in 2016 at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in South Korea, teaching American studies. In 2018, he received the Livingston College Distinguished Alumni Award.