Migration and Racism in the Americas: The Case of Migrants in the United States

Jan 29, 2021  | 12pm ET

Lecture (virtual) | Speakers: Ramón Grosfoguel (University of California, Berkeley); Comment: Julia Roth (Bielefeld University)

The German Historical Institute is pleased to announce the first session of the new virtual lecture series “Mobilities and Migration across the Americas.” The lecture series is co-sponsored by the Institute of European Studies; Global, International & Area Studies; the Center for Latin American Studies (all at UC Berkeley); The Maria Sibylla Merian Center for Advanced Latin American Studies (CALAS); Mecila: Maria Sibylla Merian Centre Conviviality-Inequality in Latin America; and the The International Research Training Group (IRTG) "Temporalities of Future."

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This lecture with Ramon Grosfoguel is the first event in a four-part lecture series on “Mobilities and Migration across the Americas”, organized by Albert Manke (Pacific Regional Office of the German Historical Institute Washington at the University of California, Berkeley) and Mario Peters (GHI Washington). Bringing together scholars from Latin America and the Caribbean, Anglo-America, and Europe, this lecture series aims provide a platform for engaging and inspiring interdisciplinary debates.

The exclusion of migrants and their descendants based on racism and xenophobia have a long historical tradition, particularly in the United States and Europe. Recent spike of populism and the securitization of borders highlight the urgency to discuss these topics in an intertwined and transregional perspective. Ramon Grosfoguel will address related questions in his lecture, and Julia Roth will provide a contextual analysis of his presentation.

About the Speakers


Ramón Grosfoguel is a Puerto Rican sociologist and a full Professor of Chicano/Latino Studies in the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. After graduating at the University of Puerto Rico, he received both his M.A. and PhD at Temple University. He belongs to the Modernity / Coloniality Group (Grupo M/C) and is internationally recognized for his work on decolonization of knowledge and power as well as for his work in international migration and political-economy of the world-system. He has been a research associate of the Maison des Science de l’Homme in Paris for many years. 

Julia Roth is a full Professor for American Studies with a focus on Gender Studies and Inter-American Studies at Bielefeld University, Germany. Prior to this position, she was postdoctoral fellow at the Freie Universität Berlin as well as lecturer at Humboldt University Berlin, the University of Potsdam and the Universidad de Guadalajara, Mexico. Her research focuses on postcolonial, decolonial and gender approaches, intersectionality and global inequalities, anti-racist feminist knowledge from the Caribbean and the Americas.

Albert Manke is a research fellow at the GHI/PRO at the University of California, Berkeley. Prior to this position, he was a postdoctoral fellow at Bielefeld University and a principal investigator at the Global South Studies Center Cologne. He specializes in Latin American and Global History with a focus on transpacific and inter-American entanglements and Cold War Studies. His core areas of interest are migration and exclusion, as well as agency-centered histories of resistance, social movements, and revolution in the Americas.

Mario Peters is a research fellow in American and Transatlantic History at the GHI Washington. Prior to this position, he was a Feodor Lynen postdoctoral fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and visiting scholar at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. Before that, he worked as an assistant professor at Leibniz University Hanover where he taught Latin American and Caribbean history at the Centre for Atlantic and Global Studies. His current research interests are spread across the intersection of mobility studies, environmental history, and the study of inter-American relations.
 

About the Lecture Series


Lectures every last Friday of each month: January 29, 2021 | February 26, 2021 | March 26, 2021 | April 30, 2021 (9am PT / 12pm ET / 6m CET). The lecture series is co-sponsored by the Institute of European Studies; Global, International & Area Studies; the Center for Latin American Studies (all at UC Berkeley); The Maria Sibylla Merian Center for Advanced Latin American Studies (CALAS); Mecila: Maria Sibylla Merian Centre Conviviality-Inequality in Latin America; and the The International Research Training Group (IRTG) "Temporalities of Future."

Over the past decade, the history of mobility in the Americas has sparked growing interest among historians and scholars from neighboring disciplines. While recent developments in international research continue to inform this trend, researchers across the region have been combining local, transregional, and transnational approaches on patterns and actors of mobility in creative ways. Setting the focus on inter-American entanglements and disentanglements, connections and ruptures, this virtual GHI lecture series addresses two major strands: the history of mobility in the sphere of transportation, planning, and infrastructure on the one hand, and the history of human mobility including migration regimes and transnational governance on the other.

In this sense, we will tap into such varied issues as urban public transport, the creation of traffic and diasporic networks and the production, circulation, and conveyance of knowledge. Secondly, we are interested in the social impacts of new infrastructure and means of transportation as well as policies regulating migration, and the significance of mobility for hemispheric relations in the Americas. Thirdly, we deem the perspective of migrants themselves, but also of technical experts and policymakers and the knowledge they convey of key importance toward a deeper understanding of the personal impact large-scale policies and planning might have on people’s livelihoods. Bringing together scholars from Latin America and the Caribbean, Anglo-America, and Europe, this lecture series shall provide a platform for engaging and inspiring interdisciplinary debates.

Organizers: Albert Manke (Pacific Regional Office of the German Historical Institute Washington at the University of Califonia, Berkeley) and Mario Peters (GHI Washington)



Migration and Racism in the Americas: The Case of Migrants in the United States

January 29, 2021
Speaker: Ramón Grosfoguel (University of California, Berkeley); Comment: Julia Roth (Bielefeld University)


Mexico and the United States: Frontierization and Migration Policies February 26, 2021
Speakers: Kateřina Březinová (Metropolitan University Prague) and Luicy Pedroza (El Colegio de México)


Public Transport in the Americas: Mobility and Transatlantic Scientific Exchanges March 26, 2021
Speakers: Andra B. Chastain (Washington State University Vancouver); Dhan Zunino Singh (National University of Quilmes)


Flying Down to Rio: Aviation, National Identities, and Hemispheric Relations in the AmericasApril 30, 2021
Speakers: Melina Piglia (National University of Mar del Plata); Leonie Schuster (Kiel University); Peter Soland (Southeast Missouri State University)