Our People

Patrick W. Anderson

Professor

Ph.D., Performance Studies, University of California, Berkeley
Joint appointment with Department of Communication
Performance studies and cultural studies; women, gender, and sexuality

Yến Lê Espiritu

Distinguished Professor

Ph.D., Sociology, University of California, Los Angeles
Gender and migration; Race and U.S. militarism; Refugee studies; Asian American studies; Southeast Asian American Studies

Ross H. Frank

Associate Professor

Ph.D., History, University of California, Berkeley
Native American History and Culture; Colonial Americas; Material Culture Studies; Indian-White Relations

José I. Fusté

Assistant Professor

Ph.D., Ethnic Studies, UC San Diego

Andrew Jolivétte

Professor and Chair of the Department of Ethnic Studies

Director NAIS Program

Monika Gosin

Associate Professor

Ph.D., Ethnic Studies, UC San Diego
Black and Latinx studies, migration studies, race and gender in popular culture and media, intergroup relations.

Curtis F. Marez

Professor 

Ph.D., English, University of California, Berkeley
Latino/a studies, migration studies, and technology studies

Sam Museus

Vice Chair, Department of Ethnic Studies

Professor

Ph.D., Higher Education Administration, Penn State University

smuseus@ucsd.edu

Holly Okonkwo

Assistant Professor

Ph.D., Anthropology, University of California, Riverside
Technology and culture and the development of feminist science studies

Shaista Patel

Assistant Professor

Ph.D., Social Justice Education, University of Toronto

Roy Pérez

Assistant Professor

Ph.D., New York University 

Christopher Perreira

Associate Professor

Ph.D., University of California, San Diego

Christen T. Sasaki

Director of Undergraduate Studies

Associate Professor

Ph.D., University of California, Los Angeles

Shelley Streeby

Director of Graduate Studies

Professor

Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley

Environmentalisms and Ecologies; Speculative Futures and World-Making; Science Studies; Feminist and Queer Theories; Latinx and Hemispheric American Studies; Social Movements and Culture; Media Studies and Digital Humanities; Visual Culture

Daphne Taylor-García

Associate Professor

K. Wayne Yang

Professor

Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley
Youth Culture and Pedagogy in the Emergence of Social Movements

Robert R. Alvarez

Professor Emeritus

Ph.D., Anthropology, Stanford University
U.S.-Mexico Borderlands; Ethnography; Transnational Markets and Entrepreneurs

Ramón Gutiérrez

Professor Emeritus

Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison
Chicano history, race and ethnicity in American life

rgutierrez@uchicago.edu

Louis J. Hock

• Professor Emeritus, Visual Arts

  Films, video tapes, media installations, public art practice
  lhock@ucsd.edu | Website

Ana Celia Zentella

Professor Emerita

Ph.D. in Educational Linguistics, University of Pennsylvania
Anthro-Political Linguistics, Bilingualism, Child Language Socialization, Latino Spanish and English Dialect

Patty Ahn

• Assistant Professor, Communication

  Critical histories and theories of U.S. television, transnational media studies with a focus on the Asia-Pacific region, gender and sexuality studies, and popular music
  pahn@ucsd.edu

Luis A. Alvarez

• Associate Professor, History

  Comparative race and ethnicity, popular culture, Chicana/o studies, Latina/o studies, African American studies, U.S.-Mexico borderlands, transnationalism, resistance, identity and community formation, cultural theory
  l2alvarez@ucsd.edu

Boatema Boateng

• Associate Professor, Communication

  Globalization and culture, intellectual property law, gender studies
  bboateng@ucsd.edu

John D. (Jody) Blanco

• Associate Professor, Literature

  Filipino literature; nineteenth-century Latin American and Caribbean literature; anti-colonial thought
  jdblanco@ucsd.edu

David Borgo

• Associate Professor, Music

  Jazz, ethnomusicology, integrative studies
  dborgo@ucsd.edu | Website

Julie Burelle

• Assistant Professor, Theatre & Dance

  Performance Studies, Cultural Studies, Native American studies,First Nations Theatre
  jburelle@ucsd.edu

Robert Cancel

• Assistant Professor, Literature

  Oral literature; modern African literature and film; Caribbean literature 
  rcancel@ucsd.edu

Gloria Elizabeth Chacon

• Assistant Professor, Literature

  Indigenous literatures of the Americas; Chican@/Latin@ literary and cultural movements; Central American poetics and politics; US Central Americans; Latin American literary and cultural theories
  gchacon@ucsd.edu

Thandeka K. Chapman

• Associate Professor, Educational Studies

  Schooling outcomes of desegregation policies in urban and suburban districts, institutional racism in school climate, curriculum, adult and student relationships, and school policies, teaching and learning writing in secondary classrooms
  tkchapman@ucsd.edu

Dennis Childs

• Associate Professor, Literature

  African American literature and culture; Black literary modernism
  drchilds@ucsd.edu

Erica Cho

• Assistant Professor, Visual Arts

  Experimental film, short-form narrative, and LGBTQ and Asian American media art
  erc037@ucsd.edu

Luz Chung

• Lecturer/Supervisor Secondary World Languages, Educational Studies

  Critical pedagogy, multicultural and multilingual education, and service-learning
  lmchung@ucsd.edu

Frances Contreras

• Associate Professor, Education Studies

  Equity and access for Latina/o; Underrepresented students in the education pipeline
  contrerasf@ucsd.edu

Anthony Davis

• Professor, Music

  African American music; the integration of improvised and notated expressive resources
  adavis@ucsd.edu | Website

Zeinabu Davis

• Professor, Communication

  Altering and diversifying the terrain of mass media, film history, world cinema and folklore
  zdavis@ucsd.edu

Ricardo R. Dominguez

• Associate Professor, Visual Arts

  Co-founder of Electronic Disturbance Theater; co-Director of the THING, an ISP for artist and activist; former member of Critical Art Ensemble; member of the New York Zapatistas; performances, tactical media events, direct actions on the streets and around the world
  rrdominguez@ucsd.edu | Website

Gerald D. Doppelt

• Professor, Philosophy

  Ethics and Social Justice
  gdoppelt@ucsd.edu | Website

Steven P. Erie

• Professor, Political Science

  Urban politics, public policy, ethnic/minority group politics, and American political development
  serie@ucsd.edu

Ivan T. Evans

• Professor, Sociology

  Power, culture, and social revolt; sociology of intellectuals
  ievans@ucsd.edu

Camille F. Forbes

• Associate Professor, Literature

  Nineteenth-century African-American literature and culture; African-American performance; American literature; cultural studies
  cfforbes@ucsd.edu | Website

Jessica Graham

• Assistant Professor, History

  Twentieth century U.S. and Brazil, (U.S.) African American and Afro-Brazilian history, race, political ideology, cultural policy/diplomacy, and transnational history
  jlgraham@ucsd.edu

David G. Gutiérrez

• Professor, History

  Chicano movements; immigration history
  dggutierrez@ucsd.edu | Website

Joseph Hankins

• Associate Professor, Anthropology

  Social movements of labor and identity, multiculturalism, neoliberalism, stigma; circulation, materiality, processes of recognition, publics; Japan, East Asia
  jdhankins@ucsd.edu | Website

Michael Hardimon

• Associate Professor, Philosophy

  19th century German Philosophy, ethics, and social and political philosophy; development of ethical thought in German philosophy from Kant to Nietzsche, and its relevance for contemporary ethical theory; "normative meta-ethics"; applied and professional ethics and philosophical problems of race
  mhardimon@ucsd.edu | Website

Tara Javidi

• Associate Professor, Electirical and Computer Engineering

  Communication networks, stochastic resource allocation, stochastic control theory, and wireless communications
  tjavidi@ucsd.edu | Website

Sara E. Johnson

• Associate Professor, Literature

  Nineteenth- and twentieth-century anglophone, francophone and hispanophone Caribbean literature and theory; African-American literature; literature of the Americas; cultural studies of the African Diaspora
  sejohn@ucsd.edu

Makeba Jones

• Lecturer, Educational Studies

  Urban education and educational equity, social and cultural organization of schools, student engagement, tracking/ability grouping, secondary school reform, educational policy, teacher professional development, school-university partnerships, and youth leadership
  m3jones@ucsd.edu

Bennetta Jules-Rosette

• Professor, Sociology

  Ethnographic Film, sociology, semiotic studies of religious discourse, tourist art, and new technologies in Africa
  bjulesrosette@ucsd.edu

Dredge Käng

• Assistant Professor, Anthropology

  Anthropology of love, beauty, sex work, sexual health, structural violence, and Hallyu (Korean Wave) studies. Geographic specialization is Southeast Asia (Thailand), with particular attention to inter-Asia and Asian diaspora connections
  kbyung@ucsd.edu

Martha Lampland

• Associate Professor, Sociology

  Political economy, history, feminist theory, science studies, social theory, and the symbolic analysis of complex societies
  mlampland@ucsd.edu

Jin-Kyung Lee

• Associate Professor, Korean and Comparative Literature

  Modern Korean Literature; Gender Studies; Korean Diasporic Cultures
  jinkyung@ucsd.edu | Website

James Lin

• Professor, Mathematics

  Algebraic topology
  j2lin@ucsd.edu

Simeon Man

• Assistant Professor, History

  Asian American history, transnational U.S. history, politics of race and empire, history of social movements
  siman@ucsd.edu

George (Jorge) Mariscal

• Professor, Literature

  Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Spanish culture; Chicano/a studies; U.S. literature of the Viet Nam War
  gmariscal@ucsd.edu

Luis Martin-Cabrera

• Associate Professor, Literature

  Peninsular and Latin American Literature and Culture; TransAtlantic Studies, Spanish Film, Critical Pedagogy, Cultural Theory
  lmartincabrera@ucsd.edu

Wendy Matsumura

• Assistant Professor, History

  Transnational labor struggles, development of class antagonisms, gender oppression and racialized discourses in the Japanese empire
  wmatsumura@ucsd.edu

John C. Moore

• Professor, Linguistics

  Spanish syntax, causative and restructuring constructions, lexical semantics, judgment types
  johnmoore@ucsd.edu | Website

Dana Murillo

• Associate Professor, History

  Intersections of colonialism with gender, ethnicity, identity formation in early Latin America
  dvmurillo@ucsd.edu

Elizabeth Newsome

• Associate Professor

  Visual Arts Ancient civilizations of Mesoamerica, including the Aztec, Olmec and Izapan cultures
  enewsome@ucsd.edu | Website

Hoang Tan Nguyen

• Associate Professor, Literature

  Asian American visual culture, Southeast Asian cinema, queer cinema, experimental film, race and pornography, film programming, and video production
  hoangnguyen@ucsd.edu

Kyong Park

• Professor, Visual Arts

  Public Culture, urban landscapes, contemporary social geography, visual arts, architecture, theory and curatorial practices, and activism in public spaces
  kdpark@ucsd.edu

Jade Y. Power-Sotomayor

• Assistant Professor, Theatre and Dance

  Latinx theatre and performance, epistemologies of the body, the intersections between race, gender and language, and inter-cultural performance in the Latin Caribbean diaspora
  jypower@ucsd.edu

Danielle Raudenbush

• Assistant Professor, Sociology

  Health and well-being of low-income people living in the United States, health in urban contexts, social cohesion among the urban poor
  draudenbush@ucsd.edu

Vanesa Ribas

• Assistant Professor, Sociology

  International Migration, Race Relations, and Work
  vribas@ucsd.edu

Emily Roxworthy

• Associate Professor, Theatre and Dance

  Performance studies, race relations, interculturalism, and Asian American theatre
  eroxworthy@ucsd.edu

Rosaura Sánchez

• Professor, Literature

  Nationalism, ethnicity, and politics; critical theory; cultural studies; Third World studies; gender studies
  rasanchez@ucsd.edu

Gershon Shafir

• Professor, Sociology

  Director, IICAS; Comparative-historical sociology, with emphases on nationalism, ethnicity, and citizenship rights
  gshafir@ucsd.edu | Website

Christo Sims

• Assistant Professor, Communication

  Science and technology studies, moral and political anthropology, and design
  christosims@ucsd.edu

Erin Suzuki

• Assistant Professor, Literature

  Asian American literature, Pacific Island literatures, American literature 1850-present, transpacific studies
  esuzuki@ucsd.edu

Olga Vásquez

• Associate Professor, Communication

  Education, Language and Ethnic Identity
  ovasquez@ucsd.edu

Kathryn Walkiewicz

• Assistant Professor, Literature

  Native American and Indigenous studies, early U.S. literature and culture, nineteenth-century literature and culture, hemispheric studies, print culture, and formations of U.S. empire
  kwalkiewicz@ucsd.edu

Mariana Wardwell

• Associate Professor, Visual Arts

  Modern / Contemporary Latino American Art History
  mwardwell@ucsd.edu

Brad "bt" Werner

• Professor, Scripps Institute of Oceanography

  Coastal Processes, Coastal Oceanography, Global Hydrography and Circulation, Modeling and State Estimation of the Oceans, Atmosphere, and Climate
  bwerner@ucsd.edu

Daniel Widener

• Associate Professor, History

  African American and Californian history; expressive culture, race and ethnicity and political radicalism
  dwidener@ucsd.edu

Tom K. Wong

• Assistant Professor, Political Science

  Politics of immigration, citizenship, and migrant illegality
  tomkwong@ucsd.edu

Elana Zilberg

• Associate Professor, Communication

  The borders between anthropology and cultural studies as they converge in debates about public culture, and Latino and Latin American studies as they intersect with developments in new critical area studies
  ezilberg@ucsd.edu | Website

Ly Thi Hai Tran (aka Hai Ly)

Ly Thi Hai Tran (aka Hai Ly) (ucsd.edu)

Lecturer

hltran@ucsd.edu
Office Hours: Remote
Office Location: SSB 242

• Fall 2023 Course
  • ETHN 122 Asian American Culture and Identity
• Winter 2024 Course
  • ETHN 123 Asian American Politics
• Spring 2024 Course
  • ETHN 126 Comp Filip & Vietnamese American Identity & Community

Tsekani Browne

Tsekani Browne (ucsd.edu)

Lecturer

Mary Klann

Mary Klann (ucsd.edu)

Lecturer 

Esther Choi

Lecturer

Katherine Steelman

Lecturer

Isabella Restrepo

President's Postdoctoral Fellowship Program

Ph.D., Feminist Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara

Isabella C. Restrepo (she/they) is an interdisciplinary feminist scholar whose research mobilizes disability studies, girlhood studies, Chicana feminist methods, and abolition studies to analyze the U.S. foster care system. Restrepo earned her doctorate in Feminist Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. An incoming UC President’s Postdoctoral Fellow in the Ethnic Studies department at UC San Diego, Restrepo’s research offers a critical lens that excavates the criminalization and pathologization that is inherent in the foster care system and centers the experiences of racialized Latina foster girls with carceral tools like behavioral diagnosis and mandated services.

Andrew Jolivette

Department Chair, Professor

Phone: 858.246.0793
Email: ajolivette@ucsd.edu

As the Department Chair, Professor Jolivétte leads the faculty of Ethnic Studies Department in building a more consistent, transparent, and inclusive climate for all. Professor Jolivétte plans department programs in teaching, research, and other functions and ensures that departmental business is conducted ethically and in accordance with relevant laws, regulations and University policies.

Gennie B. Miranda

Chief Administrative Officer

Phone: 858.534.3278
Email: gbmiranda@ucsd.edu

As the Chief Administrative Officer of the Department of Ethnic Studies, Gennie manages departmental administrative functions including finance and budget, faculty recruitment, faculty support, human resources, website, facilities, and staff supervision. Gennie is the contact for all academic personnel and academic appointment file processing for Faculty and Lecturers. She processes tasks such as advancement, compensation, benefits, UC Path entries, leaves of absence, APOL job postings and policies and procedures. 

Jessica Williams

Graduate Coordinator

Phone: 858.534.6040
Email: jjwilliams@ucsd.edu

Jessica is responsible for all aspects pertaining to the administration and implementation of the graduate program. She advises students, manages the graduate admissions process, Ph.D. program outreach, graduate recruitment visits, and new student orientation; she assesses need for TA and Reader support and facilitates TA and Reader employment. Jessica is the primary resource for graduate students and faculty/staff within and outside the department regarding fiscal support issues, including block grant/TA FTE and external agency support. She coordinates and manages the academic progress of graduate students, evaluation documentation, and maintains all graduate record files.

Mónica RodriQuez de Cabaza

Undergraduate Coordinator

Phone: 858.534.3277
Email: ethnicstudies@ucsd.edu

Mónica is responsible for the administration of the undergraduate program, coordinating department curriculum and scheduling, academic counseling and advising of undergraduate students on degree requirements, adds and drops, etc., evaluating and processing final degree checks, preparing the catalog copy, and all other miscellaneous course and undergraduate matters including the honors program. Mónica is the liaison with campus-wide undergraduate student affairs units and community. She actively recruits potential students, promotes and advertises the undergraduate program campus-wide, and attends all campus outreach events. Mónica also provides advice to undergraduate students on graduate school and career opportunities.

Mónica earned her B.A. in Ethnic Studies at UC San Diego and attended Eleanor Roosevelt College. The UCSD Early Academic Outreach Program (EAOP) is what helped to encourage her to attend a four-year university and she was invited to participate in Summer Bridge to help acclimate her transition to UCSD. Unfortunately, due to the high cost of education and other personal factors, she had to drop out of college. Mónica was determined to earn her degree, she applied for a staff position on campus and was able to simultaneously complete her major.

Mónica has now been on campus for 29 years both as a student and a staff member. She started as a part-time Intake Advisor/HR manager/finance assistant with the Warren Writing Program. She then had the opportunity to work at UCSD Extended Studies in Student Services. Next, Mónica worked for a high school summer outreach program called COSMOS at the Jacobs School of Engineering. Prior to working at Ethnic Studies, Mónica was the Program Coordinator for the Chinese Studies Program at UCSD. In 2016 Mónica returned to Ethnic Studies as the Undergraduate Academic Advisor and is achieving her career goal of helping Undergraduate students earn their degree at UC San Diego.

Karen Miranda

Financial and Human Resources Analyst

Phone: 858.822.0650
Email: kmiranda@ucsd.edu

Karen has independent administrative responsibility for the financial administration, management and analysis of department funds including state, contract and grant, gifts, and donations. Responsibilities include management of all extramural and state funds, administration of the departmental operating budget, and contract and grant administration (pre- and post-award).

Karen also independently manages all aspects of staff personnel in the department. She provides expert advice, instruction and policy interpretation to the Chair, faculty, CAO and staff on all matters involving personnel administration, including recruitment, appointment, advancement, classification, compensation, benefits, grievance/disciplinary actions, and employee relations. As the Departmental Security Administrators, she can grant access to Business Systems and Active Directory.

Maddie Weisblatt

Student Assistant

Phone: 858.534.3276
Email: es-asst@ucsd.edu

Maddie is the fiscal and administrative assistant. She supports both the Ethnic Studies Department and Critical Gender Studies Program.

Iliana Maiz

Student Assistant

Phone: 858.534.3276
Email: ethniccommunications@ucsd.edu

Iliana is the communications and design assistant. She creates flyers and other communication materials for the department, makes web updates and manages social media.