Jennifer Strtak is a historian working at the intersection of technology, science, and the built environment, specializing on early modern Europe. Her research examines how technological artifacts shape daily life in urban settings.

At Princeton, Strtak is completing a draft of her first book manuscript, The Driving Divide: The Carriage, Social Inequality, and Urban Transformation in Early Modern Paris. This work investigates how transportation technology influenced power dynamics in one of Europe’s largest cities from 1650 to 1789. Although scholars have extensively analyzed the social, political, and economic factors shaping early modern urban development, they often focus on monumental architecture or zoning policies related to environmental and public health challenges. While these perspectives reveal how significant events, such as military triumphs or epidemics, affected urban form, they frequently overlook the role of everyday practices in fostering gradual yet significant transformations in the city’s spatial and social dynamics. The Driving Divide reevaluates urban development by illustrating how the daily journeys of thousands of carriages co-produced changes in both the landscape of Paris and its social interactions. The book highlights the importance of non-human elements in historical narratives, arguing that mobility in Paris involved a complex interplay rather than being merely about physical movement. Each carriage ride represented a dynamic interaction between technology, space, and individuals, either expanding or constraining access to urban areas. In this way, vehicles reconceptualized urban infrastructure, significantly influencing human welfare while simultaneously creating new social inequalities and reinforcing existing ones.

Prior to arriving at Princeton University, Strtak earned her PhD in History at Yale University (2024). She obtained her MPhil in History from Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge (2016) and her BA from Trinity College, University of Toronto (2015). During the 2021-2022 academic year, Strtak was an invited Research Fellow at the Institut d’études politiques de Paris. Her research has been generously supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada-Conseil de recherches en sciences humaines du Canada as well as the Fox International Fellowship Program.

In Spring 2025 she will teach a new seminar titled, City and Nature: Urban Nature and Society, 1450-1800.

Strtak's fellowship is supported by the Mellon Foundation, the Princeton University Humanities Council, and the Department of Art & Archeology.