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The Strange and Curious History of the Illegal Alien

Speaker:
Evelyn Hu-DeHart - Professor of History and Ethnic Studies, Brown University

When:
April 17, 2012 7:00pm to 12:00am
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Speaker:
Evelyn Hu-DeHart - Professor of History and Ethnic Studies, Brown University

History informs and history obscures. The story of how the “illegal alien” has come into our popular culture as a highly controversial and even outright unsavory trope is rooted in our history, some pieces of which have been forgotten, other pieces of which have been distorted and manipulated. Most of all, this is both a transnational and trans-Pacific story that are tied to each other and to the formation of America’s self image as an immigrant na­tion. With China and Mexico looming large on America’s horizons, how can a clear understanding of the “illegal alien” help clarify America’s position in the world today? 

Evelyn Hu-DeHart is Professor of History, and Director of the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America at Brown. She joined Brown from the University of Colorado at Boulder where she was Chair of the Department of Ethnic Studies and Director of the Center for Studies of Ethnicity and Race in America. She has also taught at the City University of New York system, New York University, Washington University in St. Louis, University of Arizona and University of Michigan, as well as lectured at universities and research institutes in Mexico, Peru, Cuba, France, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China.

Phone Number: 
(909) 607-8035