Sara Dant
Sara Dant is an award-winning writer, historian, distinguished professor emeritus, runner, and avid outdoor enthusiast who lives in the Galisteo River Valley outside Santa Fe, New Mexico. She was born and raised in the West, received all my degrees from western universities, and she is proud to live in the part of the country where the air is dry and the mountains are high.
Her recent book is Losing Eden: An Environmental History of the American West (2023), a “big history” of the interaction between people and nature across twenty-five thousand years in the West. Reviewers have generously praised the writing, clarity, and breadth of Losing Eden, calling it “a brilliant book,” “stunning,” and “a powerful, irreplaceable environmental history.”
In addition to her writing, she was a featured advisor and interviewee for the Ken Burns documentary film, The American Buffalo (2023). Her experience as a public speaker has resulted in regular guest appearances on podcasts and documentaries. She also gives talks and multi-media presentations at events, fundraisers, banquets, and conferences across the country. Additionally, she has been hired to provide expert witness historical research and testimony in court, including a precedent-setting report on Stream Navigability upheld by the Utah Supreme Court. As a lapsed journalism major, she is always interested in talking with reporters and other writers.
Her expertise is in the history of the American West, U.S. environmental history and politics, and American historical trends. Her writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Seattle Times, PBS.org, Daily Gazette (NY), San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Press Democrat (CA), The Mercury (KS), and Colorado Sun as well as numerous scholarly publications.
Before retiring from academia in 2024 to write full-time, she was Brady Presidential Distinguished Professor and Professor and Chair of History at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah. She earned her BS in Public Relations and Journalism from Northern Arizona University, and her MA in American Studies and PhD in History from Washington State University. Go Cougs!
