Laurent Dubois

John L. Nau III Bicentennial Professor in the History & Principles of Democracy and Director for Academic Affairs of the Democracy Initiative (University of Virginia)


Laurent Dubois is Professor of History and Co-Director of the Democracy Initiative at the University of Virginia. From 2007 to 2020, he was Professor of Romance Studies & History at Duke University, where he founded and directed the Forum for Scholars & Publics. He has written about the Age of Revolution in the Caribbean, with Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution (2004) and A Colony of Citizens: Revolution and Slave Emancipation in the French Caribbean, 1787-1804 (2004), which won four book prizes including the Frederick Douglass Prize. His 2012 Haiti: The Aftershocks of History was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. He has also written about the politics of soccer, with Soccer Empire: The World Cup and the Future of France (2010) and The Language of the Game: How to Understand Soccer (2018). His work on the cultural history of music, The Banjo: America's African Instrument (2016), was supported by a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Humanities Fellowship, and a Mellon New Directions Fellowship. His most recent book is Freedom Roots: Histories from the Caribbean (University of North Carolina Press, 2019), co-authored with Richard Turits. His writings on music, history and sport have appeared in The Atlantic, The NationThe New RepublicThe New YorkerThe New York Times, Slate, and Sports Illustrated.