Prior to becoming Dean of the College of University Studies and Programs at CSUMB, Dr. Anderson taught history at the University of Indianapolis from 1981 to 2004 and was Dean of Arts and Sciences there from 2001 to 2004. He is president of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR) for 2005. He served on the editorial board of Diplomatic History (1990-1992) and is on the editorial board of the Vietnam Documentation Project of the National Security Archive. He is general editor of the book series Vietnam: America in the War Years published by Rowman & Littlefield.
Dean Anderson's books include Imperialism and Idealism: American Diplomats in China (Indiana, 1985), Trapped by Success: The Eisenhower Administration and Vietnam (Columbia, 1991), Shadow on the White House: Presidents and the Vietnam War (Kansas, 1993), Facing My Lai: Moving Beyond the Massacre (Kansas, 1998), The Human Tradition in the Vietnam Era (Scholarly Resources, 2000), The Columbia Guide to the Vietnam War (Columbia, 2002), The Human Tradition in America since 1945 (Scholarly Resources, 2003), and The Vietnam War (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005). Trapped by Success received the Robert H. Ferrell Book Prize from SHAFR. The Columbia Guide to the Vietnam War earned a “Best of the Best” designation from the American Library Association and the American Association of University Presses and an “Outstanding Academic Title” listing from Choice magazine. The Council for the Advancement and Support of Education in Washington, D.C. named Anderson the 1991 Indiana Professor of the Year. His current project is the Columbia History of the Vietnam War.
In 1994 Dr. Anderson was Visiting Professor of History at Anhui Normal University in the People's Republic of China. In his 30-year career in higher education, he has also taught at the University of Montana, Texas Tech University, Sam Houston State University (Huntsville, Texas), and California Polytechnic State University (San Luis Obispo). He has a B.A. from Rice University, and M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Virginia. He served in the U.S. Army and is a veteran of the Vietnam War.
German Secondary Education B.S., Kansas University