History MA Alum, Alexi Henderson ’22 Wins Best Masters Thesis Award

We are proud to announce that recent History MA graduate, Alexi Henderson, was awarded the 2022 NC State Humanities & Social Sciences Award for the Best Masters Thesis. Her thesis, “No Fortunate Son: Marginalized Women Veterans of the U.S. War in Vietnam,” was completed under the direction of Dr. Nancy Mitchell. In  “No Fortunate Son,” Alexi argues that in order to create  a more “just memory,” we must broaden our field of vision to include those who have been erased from memory – specifically, black American women veterans and South Vietnamese women veterans. Alexi took on the difficult task of finding and interviewing black and South Vietnamese women veterans of the war. Says Dr. Mitchell of Alexi’s work, “Her thesis is a penetrating analysis of these oral histories. This is true primary research and a significant contribution to our understanding of the US war in Vietnam.”

Post graduation, Alexi plans on staying in the Raleigh area to teach social studies in the Wake County Public School System.