David R. M. Beck is a Professor in the Department of History at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he also holds an affiliate faculty appointment in the Program in American Indian Studies. He serves on the department's Executive Committee until 2027, as well as on committees for Campus Senate representation, History Workshop, and Job Search and Career Development. Beck earned a B.A. in American Culture from Northwestern University, an M.A. in History from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and a Ph.D. in History from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Before joining UIUC, he taught for more than two decades as a professor in the Native American Studies Department at the University of Montana, and previously at NAES College and the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Beck's research focuses on the history of federal American Indian policy, urban American Indian history, and the U.S. government's treatment of Indigenous peoples on the continent and in the Pacific during the Cold War. He is the author and co-author of several award-winning books, including Bribed with Our Own Money: Federal Abuse of American Indian Funds in the Termination Era (University of Nebraska Press, 2024), which examines federal coercion and bribery tactics to terminate relationships with tribes in the 1950s and 1960s; Unfair Labor? American Indians and the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago (2019); City Indian: Native American Activism in Chicago, 1893-1934 (with Rosalyn R. LaPier, 2015; winner of the Robert G. Athearn Book Award from the Western History Association); The Struggle for Self-Determination: History of the Menominee Indians Since 1854 (2005; Wisconsin Historical Society Book Award); Siege and Survival: History of the Menominee Indians, 1634-1856 (2002; Wisconsin Historical Society Book Award of Merit); and Seeking Recognition: The Termination and Restoration of the Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians, 1855-1984 (2009). His contributions have been recognized with the George M. Dennison Presidential Faculty Award for Distinguished Accomplishment from the University of Montana in 2021.

Professional Email: davebeck@illinois.edu