Christen T. Sasaki

Biography

Christen T. Sasaki received her doctorate in History from the University of California, Los Angeles. Prior to her appointment at UCSD, she was an assistant professor at San Francisco State University.

Sasaki’s research and published works focus on the politics of race and empire in the Pacific Island world. Her first book, Pacific Confluence: Fighting over the Nation in 19th Century Hawai‘i (University of California Press, 2022) argues that the attempt to create a US-backed white settler state in the archipelago sparked a turn-of-the-century debate about race-based nationalism and state-based sovereignty that was fought on the global stage. Her recent articles include “Making Sartorial Sense of Empire: Contested Meanings of Aloha Shirt Aesthetics,” published in The Contemporary Pacific and “Emerging Nations, Emerging Empires: Citizenship and Sovereignty in 1893 Hawai‘i,” published in the Pacific Historical Review.

Research interests: Asian American Studies, Transnational U.S. History, Race and Empire, Militourism, Japanese American History, History and Memory

Selected Publications

Journal Articles:

“Making Sartorial Sense of Empire: Contested Meanings of Aloha Shirt Aesthetics,” The Contemporary Pacific (34:1). [In Press]

“Emerging Nations, Emerging Empires: Citizenship and Sovereignty in 1893 Hawai‘i,” Pacific Historical Review (2021) 90 (1): 28–56.

“Threads of Empire: Militourism and the Aloha Wear Industry in Hawai‘i,” American Quarterly 68.3 (2016): 643-667.

“The Possibilities for Pacific Islander Studies in the Continental United States,” de Guzman, John-Paul R., Alfred Peredo Flores, Kristopher Kaupalolo, Christen Sasaki, Kēhaulani Vaughn, and Joyce Pualani Warren, in “Transoceanic Flows: Pacific Islander Interventions Across the American Empire,” ed. Keith L. Camacho, Amerasia Journal, no. 3 (2012):141-161.

Edited Volumes:

Asian American History: Primary Documents of the Asian American Experience, ed. Jonathan

H. X. Lee and Christen T. Sasaki. (Cognella Academic Publishing, 2015).

Book Chapters:

“How the Portuguese Became White: The Racial Politics of Pre-Annexation Hawai‘i,” in Pacific America: Histories of Transoceanic Crossings, ed. Lon Kurashige (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2017).