Public Programs
Since 1965, the IHRC has organized conferences, workshops, and public programs to promote research, teaching, and public conversation around immigration, race, and ethnicity in the United States.
Featured Upcoming and Past Events
Upcoming Events
April 30, 2025
3:30-4:45pm
308 Andersen Library
Please join the Immigration History Research Center to discuss a work-in-progress by IAS Postdoctoral Fellow Eduardo Bautista Duran entitled “Negotiating Order in Turbulent Times: The Imperial Origins of Policing in Gold Rush California.”
The work-in-progress will be circulated a week before the workshop to all who have rsvp’d. Please feel free to attend even if you do not have time to read the piece to be workshopped.
Light refreshments will be served.
Register here.
Negotiating Order in Turbulent Times: The Imperial Origins of Policing in Gold Rush California
Recent work by scholars of policing in the U.S. context have explored some of the ways in which imperial coercion abroad has influenced policing within the United State's domestic borders. This paper offers key interventions in U.S. police historiography by situating the development of policing within the backdrop of Anglo conquest along the frontier West. Bautista Duran specifically turns to gold rush California to propose that the struggle to establish order along the "Wild West" was tied to empire-building and its correlates of racialized power, colonial domination, and global capitalism. In doing so, he contributes to a growing body of literature that situates the development of U.S. policing not in urban municipal policing, but in sites where the metropole, colony, militarism, and global capitalism collide.
Eduardo Bautista Duran is an interdisciplinary scholar of the U.S. carceral state and a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Minnesota’s Institute for Advanced Study. Originally from Michoacan, Mexico, Eduardo grew up in San Jose and Oakland, California, and he received his PhD in Jurisprudence & Social Policy from the University of California at Berkeley. His research focuses on the colonial antecedents of U.S. policing with an emphasis on California and the Western borderlands in the mid-nineteenth century. Eduardo’s work situates the development of policing in a turbulent era in the aftermath of the California gold rush, imperial war campaigns, and struggles for territorial domination in a period of rampant capitalist growth. His previous research addresses the ways in which racism makes its way into everyday policing in a co-authored article published in the journal City & Community and his scholarship discusses police abolitionist discourse in academia.
Monday, May 5, 2025
5pm-6pm Central
via Zoom
This archival project explores the hidden role of post-WWII migrants from the Baltic states and Eastern Europe in shaping US-Soviet relations through soft power. Kancans focuses primarily on cultural "proxy battles" such as international hockey tournaments and political institutions such as the Captive Nations Committee, which often stood in for open military conflict and shaped public opinion in the US.
Vincent Kancans is a PhD Candidate in Germanic Studies with a minor in Moving Image Studies at the University of Minnesota. His dissertation is a media history of magnetic tape's invention, mass adoption, decline, and recent revival. More broadly, he researches the ways that ordinary citizens use technical media to challenge state and corporate power structures. He is the recipient of the 2024-2025 American Latvian Association Fellowship.
Register at z.umn.edu/Kancans
This event is co-sponsored by the Immigration History Research Center Archives of the University of Minnesota Libraries.
May 6, 2025
9:30-10:30am
Heller Hall 1210
The Immigration History Research Center and the Binger Center for New Americans invite you to a conversation on today’s immigration landscape and its historical precedents.
Register here.
The past few months have seen a wave of executive orders and actions around immigration. They have been dizzying in their speed and scope, even for experts. We are hoping to convene scholars of immigration to share knowledge and expertise with one another. There will be no formal presentations, just a moderated discussion. The aim is to enhance one another’s understanding and to shape the future work of our centers: What questions can we answer for each other? What questions should direct our research and advocacy? What questions should we invite outside experts to campus to help us answer?
The IHRC and the BCNA are particularly well positioned to consider questions of precedent. Are the administration’s actions truly “unprecedented,” as we often hear? What histories and legal structures are helpful to understand our current moment? What global perspectives can offer us insight?
Please forward this invitation to anyone you think would contribute to the conversation. Given this discussion’s format and aims, we are envisioning a relatively small group. We are primarily inviting faculty and graduate/law students, but motivated undergraduates and relevant community partners are welcome to attend.
Coffee and snacks will be provided.
Past Events
Tuesday, April 22, 2025
On April 22, the IHRC and the Immigration and Ethnic History Society hosted a webinar marking the 150th anniversary of the Page Act of 1875, which excluded women imported for the purposes of prostitution and convicted criminals and criminalized the importation of forcibly recruited Asian workers. Targeted largely at Chinese migrants, especially women, the law was the federal government’s first direct attempt to limit Asian immigration to the United States. This event uses the anniversary as an opportunity to discuss the significance of the Page Act for US immigration history, Asian American history, and more broadly the politics of race, gender, and class in US history based on the most recent scholarship.
Speakers:
* Charlotte Brooks, Baruch College
* Hardeep Dhillon, University of Pennsylvania
* Beth Lew-Williams, Princeton University
* Eva Payne, University of Mississippi
* Naoko Wake, Michigan State University (Moderator)
This event was sponsored by the Immigration History Research Center and the Immigration and Ethnic History Society.
Tuesday, April 1, 2025
Liberal Arts Engagement Hub, Room 120, Pillsbury Hall, 315 Pillsbury Drive SE
The IHRC hosted a conversation with Lori A. Flores about her new book, Awaiting their Feast: Latinx Food Workers and Activism from World War II to COVID-19. With opening remarks by José Luis Villaseñor Rangel, from Tamales y Bicicletas.
Lori A. Flores is Associate Professor of History at Stony Brook University (SUNY), where she teaches courses in U.S., Latinx, labor, immigration, food, and borderlands history. She is the author of Grounds for Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement (Yale, 2016) and the new book Awaiting Their Feast: Latinx Food Workers and Activism from World War II to COVID-19 (UNC, 2025). She is also co-editor of The Academic’s Handbook (Duke, 2020) with Jocelyn Olcott. Her research and writing have been supported by institutions including the Russell Sage Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center in Italy.
Tamales y Bicicletas is dedicated to strengthening our Latino and immigrant communities through bike projects, green farming, cultural empowerment, and environmental justice.
Co-sponsored by Chicano & Latino Studies, the Department of History, and the Center for Race, Indigeneity, Disability, Gender & Sexuality (RIDGS).
Wednesday, March 26, 2025
In a special issue of the Journal of American Ethnic History, Naoko Wake traced the ways in which “Asian American experiences of disability have been made invisible,” and argued that ableism shaped the experiences of Asian immigrants as profoundly as racism did. This panel drew together the contributors to the special issue for a conversation on the history, archives, and methods of Asian American disability, with commentary from Feminist Studies and Asian American Studies scholar Jigna Desai. The Journal of American Ethnic History and University of Illinois press have generously agreed to make the special issue open access from March 15-April 15 so that panel attendees can engage with this important work.
Featuring:
Jigna Desai, University of CA Santa Barbara
Jonathan Hsy, George Washington University
Selena Moon, University of MN
Jennifer Row, University of MN
Naoko Wake, Michigan State University
Alice Zhang, Florida State University
Co-sponsored by the Immigration History Research Center, the Asian American Studies Program, the Critical Disability Studies Collective, and the Department of History.
Thursday, March 6, 2025
Global climate change has resulted in global climate-related migration that impacts different countries and regions uniquely. Our experts explain what climate migration is, how it impacts Finland and the United States, and what governments can do to be better prepared.
Speakers:
Lawrence Huang, Migration Policy Institute
Jocelyn Perry, Refugees International
Eeva-Kaisa Prokkola, University of Oulu (Finland)
Michele Waslin, IHRC (moderator)
This event was co-sponsored by the Immigration History Research Center, the Immigration History Research Center Archives, and the Migration Institute of Finland.
Thursday, Feb. 13
10-11:30am Central
This webinar introduced three innovative research projects that use spatial humanities approaches to research, analyze, and visualize policies and practices of segregation in North America.
Speakers:
Dr. Cheryl Troupe, University of Saskatchewan, “Mapping Métis Displacement in Saskatchewan”
Dr. Saara Kekki, University of Helsinki, “A Community in Motion: Reassessing Japanese American Resettlement in Post-World War II Society”
Dr. Kirsten Delegard, University of Minnesota, “Mapping Prejudice in Minnesota”
Chair: Dr. Samira Saramo, Migration Institute of Finland
The webinar was organized by the “Migrant Experiences, Past and Present” project funded by the Public Diplomacy Section of the US Embassy in Finland, in collaboration with the Migration Institute of Finland, Immigration History Research Center, and Immigration History Research Center Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries
Wednesday, Feb. 12, 2025
With immigration in the news, a historical perspective is more valuable than ever to help us understand the current situation in a deeper context and beyond the sensational images and narratives online. What do current trends in immigration share with those of our nation’s past? In what ways have migration trends shifted from those earlier patterns? What are the new questions and methods driving cutting-edge historical research on immigration? What role can historians play in bringing key insights to policy discussions that are too often polarized and driven by rumor rather than reality?
Fortunately the University of Minnesota has a long tradition of excellence in immigration history. On Feb. 12, 2025 the History Department's History Book Club welcomed both the current and immediate past directors of the Immigration History Research Center for this critical conversation about the role of migration in our country’s past and present.
Speakers:
Llana Barber, Rudolph J. Vecoli Chair in Immigration History and Director, Immigration History Research Center
Erika Lee, Bae Family Professor of History, Radcliffe Alumnae Professor, and the Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Director Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America at Harvard University
Lecture and Reception
Wednesday, Feb. 5, 2025
Rose Cuison-Villazor presented her work on Forbidden Love, highlighting the ways that military, immigration, and other federal officials restricted the ability of Japanese women and American men to marry during the U.S. government’s occupation of Japan (1945 to 1952). In so doing, Cuison-Villazor revealed the federal government’s central role, alongside state actors, in obstructing interracial marriages and reinforcing a racial caste system in the United States. Using a complex web of immigration laws, military policies, and citizenship rules, the federal government actively policed the borders of the heart—and what it meant to be a family, a citizen, and an American.
Rose Cuison-Villazor is Professor of Law and Chancellor's Social Justice Scholar and Director of the Rutgers Center for Immigrant Justice at Rutgers Law School.
This event was co-sponsored by The Binger Center for New Americans, The Department of History, and The Asian American Studies Program at the University of Minnesota.
Webinar
Thursday, January 23
This webinar showcased four innovative PhD dissertation projects on Finnish North American history and heritage. The speakers presented new approaches from the perspectives of history, folklore studies, linguistics, and literature.
This webinar was organized by the “Migrant Experiences, Past and Present” project funded by the Public Diplomacy Section of the US Embassy in Finland, in collaboration with the Migration Institute of Finland, Immigration History Research Center, Immigration History Research Center Archives, University of Minnesota Libraries, and the Finnish American Studies Association.
Speakers:
Mirva Johnson, University of Wisconsin-Madison, “From Ethnic to Local: Linguistic and Cultural Change in Northern Wisconsin”
Tanja Juuri, Tampere University, “The Finnish-Canadian Multilocal Landscape of Home and Labour in the Early 20th Century”
Lotta Leiwo, University of Helsinki, “Weathering Capitalism: Finnish American Women and Nature-Related Socialist Rhetoric”
Roma Lucarelli, University of Minnesota Twin Cities, “The Legacy of the Kalevala: Finnish Immigration, Co-Operative Mechanisms, and Agricultural-Based Homesteading”
Friday, December 6, 2024
12-1pm
Mondale Hall Room 40
A forward-looking discussion on what the incoming presidency might mean for immigration policy, DACA, mixed status families, and international students, as well as information about knowing your rights and participating in advocacy.
This event was hosted by The James H. Binger Center for New Americans, The Immigration History Research Center, The Chicano & Latino Studies Department, RIDGS, and MALCS
Tuesday, Nov. 19
6:00-8:00pm
Open Book, 1011 Washington Ave. S. Minneapolis, MN
This event, co-sponsored by The Advocates for Human Rights and the Binger Center for New Americans, featured Carol Cleaveland and Michele Waslin in conversation with Michele McKenzie, Deputy Director of The Advocates. The authors of Private Violence: Latin American Women and the Struggle for Asylum, will discuss their new book.
Monday, November 18 from 3:00pm-5:00pm
Andersen Library, Room 120
Michele Waslin and Carol Cleaveland discussed their new book, Private Violence: Latin American Women and the Struggle for Asylum. Through eyewitness accounts of closed-court proceedings and powerful testimony from women who have sought asylum in the United States because of severe assaults and death threats by intimate partners and/or gang members, Private Violence examines how immigration laws and policies shape the lives of Latin American women who seek safety in the United States. The authors described the women’s histories prior to crossing the border, and the legal strategies they use to convince Immigration Judges that rape and other forms of “private violence” should merit asylum – despite laws built on Cold War era assumptions that persecution occurs in the public sphere by state actors. Former Immigration Judge Susan Conley de Castro provided her perspective on gender-based asylum.
Speakers:
* Carol Cleaveland, PhD, Professor of Social Work, George Mason University
* The Honorable Susan Conley de Castro, retired Immigration Judge
* Michele Waslin, PhD, Assistant Director, Immigration History Research Center
* Mackenzie Heinrichs, Binger Center for New Americans (moderator)
The discussion was followed by a reception. This event was cosponsored by the Binger Center for New Americans.
As Haitian immigrants face a firestorm of baseless accusations in the media, this panel seeks to answer: how did we get here? The IHRC’s new History of the Present webinar series is designed to give historical context for a contemporary immigration issue. In our inaugural webinar, panelists discussed the history of Haiti and Haitian immigration as well as the issues facing Haitian immigrants today.
Speakers:
Regine Jackson, Morehouse College
Guerline Jozef, Haitian Bridge Alliance
Felix Jean-Louis, University of California Irvine
Carl Lindskoog, Raritan Valley Community College
Jemima Pierre, University of British Columbia
Llana Barber, IHRC (Moderator)
The recording of the webinar is available HERE.
This event was co-sponsored by the Department of History
The IHRC's Graduate Student Group (GSG), a community of interdisciplinary student scholars in immigration and migration fields, convened at the Immigration History Research Center on Wednesday, September 18, from 12 to 1:30 p.m. in Andersen Library Room 308. The students had an opportunity to meet with the new IHRC director, Dr. Llana Barber, and exchange ideas for future workshops and presentations by and for GSG members.
September 10, 2024
Immigration is a hot issue this election season. How are the candidates talking about immigration? What policies are being discussed? What can we learn from past elections? Our panel of experts answered these questions and more.
Speakers:
Llana Barber, PhD, Director IHRC (moderator)
David Bier, Cato Institute
Julia Decker, Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota
S. Deborah Kang, PhD, University of Virginia
Yale Schacher, PhD, Refugees International
See the recording HERE.
This event was co-sponsored by the Institute for Global Studies and is part of the Election Education Series.
On Tuesday, April 23rd from 2-3 pm in Andersen Library Rm 308, the Immigration History Research Center and Immigration History Research Center Archives hosted Ibrahim Hirsi, University of Minnesota PhD Candidate in History. Hirsi's research focuses on twentieth-century American history, transnational migrations, maritime labor, and the Black diaspora.
At this event, Hirsi presented research from his dissertation titled, The First Somali Diaspora: A Transnational History of Migration, Race, and Resistance. This work traces the journeys of Somali migrant laborers from British Somaliland to the United States and the United Kingdom and places Somalis’ experiences in a broader historical context, explaining how the Black diaspora was racialized at sea and ashore.
On Tuesday, April 16th from noon - 1pm, the Binger Center for New Americans and the Immigration History Research Center at the University of Minnesota hosted a conversation with César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández about his new book, Welcome the Wretched: In Defense of the “Criminal Alien”. His book draws on history, legal analyses and philosophy to counter “the fundamental assumption that criminal activity has a rightful place in immigration matters, arguing that instead of using the criminal legal system to identify people to deport, the United States should place a reimagined sense of citizenship and solidarity at the center of immigration policy.” Professor García Hernández discussed his book with University of Minnesota experts Jimmy Patiño from Chicano & Latino Studies and Seiko Shastri from the Law School.
On Friday, March 22nd, the Immigration History Research Center welcomed celebrated Hmong American poet Mai Der Vang to discuss the newest works of award winning author Kao Kalia Yang and award winning artist Pao Houa Her.
Kao Kalia Yang read from her new works A Rock in My Throat and Where River's Part: A Story of My Mother's Life and Pao Houa Her shared images from her first monograph My Grandfather Turned Into a Tiger...and Other Illusions.
This event was co-sponsored by the Hmong Cultural Center Museum, the Immigration History Research Center Archives, the Liberal Arts Engagement Hub, the Preserving and Promoting Hmong American History Hub Residency, and the Asian American Studies Department.
On February 20th from 3:30-5:00pm CT, the Immigration History Research Center partnered with the Immigration and Ethnic History Society to present a webinar exploring the history of the Immigration Act of 1924. 100 years ago, the U.S. Congress passed the Emergency Quota Act of 1921, and then, three years later, the 1924 Immigration Act. Together, these laws inaugurated an unprecedented era of immigration restriction, further legitimized discrimination based on race and national origin in immigration law, and established the national origins quota system which remained in place for over forty years. This webinar explores how the immigration system created by the 1924 Immigration Act reshaped American society and affected migration flows around the world.
On Thursday, February 15th, the IHRC Student workshop hosted Cynthia Pando, a PhD candidate in Health Services Research, Policy, and Administration at the University of Minnesota. Cynthia holds a bachelor's degree in Behavioral Neuroscience and Sociology and a master's degree in Sociology from Lehigh University.
Cynthia presented research from her dissertation: "The Public Charge Rule: How Proposed Changes in Immigration Policy Affected Latinx Citizen Children's Medicaid Enrollment." The project focuses on the indirect effects of the 2017 proposed public charge rule, an immigration policy, on Medicaid enrollment and healthcare experiences of US-citizen Latinx children with immigrant parents.
On Monday, February 12th, Dr. Katherine Fennelly shared insights into her new book: Family Declassified: Uncovering My Grandfather's Journey from Spy to Children's Book Author. In Family Declassified, University of Minnesota Professor Emerita Katherine Fennelly delves into the extraordinary life of her maternal grandfather, a Jewish Hungarian immigrant who arrived in the US 100 years ago. It took several years of reviewing previously unexamined government records and conducting personal interviews and genealogical searches to piece together the life of a man who hid his Jewish identity, worked as a spy, and became a chef and children’s book author. This fascinating story examines the nature of family myths and presents the gripping story of a man whose life was shaped by some of the most extraordinary events of the 20th century.
This conversation was moderated by Dr. Leslie Morris, Chair, Department of German, Nordic, Slavic & Dutch and Beverly and Richard Fink Professor in Liberal Arts.
The event was co-sponsored by the Center for Austrian Studies, the Center for Jewish Studies, Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs, and the Department of German, Nordic, Slavic, and Dutch.
On Wednesday, December 6th from 4-5:30pm Central in Andersen Library 120 the IHRC co-sponsored an event with Somali-Italian author, novelist, playwright, librettist, and oral performer Ubah Cristina Ali Farah who read from her book, Commander of the River. Published by the University of Indiana Press, this book is "a timeless and compelling coming-of-age story set in contemporary Italy... [and] explores the themes of racism, trauma, adolescent angst, and the rebellious torments of the young."
The event was co-sponsored by the Immigration History Research Center Archives; the Institute for Global Studies; the Department of French and Italian; the African Studies Initiative; the Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Office of the College of Liberal Arts; the Center for German and European Studies, and the Italian Cultural Center.
On November 30th, from 11:30am-12:30pm graduate students Isabel Bethke, Kim Horner, and Isabella Irtifa presented and workshopped current research projects. Presentations included:
Mediating Marriage & Migration: Examining Narrative Strategies of Legal Actors (Bethke & Horner)
Women Waging Peace: Political Action as a Means of Collective Healing in Jordan (Irtifa)
On this webinar, held October 11, 2023, a panel of experts presented the very latest information on immigration trends in Minnesota, the Twin Cities, and the University of Minnesota. This conversation is one step toward further development of an engaged, informed, and collaborative community comprised of university and community members interested in im/migration-related matters.
This event was co-sponsored by the James H. Binger Center for New Americans and the Center for Global Health and Social Responsibility.
On April 11, 2023 Dr. Carly Goodman, author of Dreamland: America's Immigration Lottery in an Age of Restriction joined the IHRC to discuss her book. Dreamland tells the story of the Diversity Visa Lottery, created in 1990 to foster diversity. The book traces this unlikely government program and its role in American life as well as the global story of migration. Goodman's talk focused on the impact of the lottery on migrants from African countries, and how rising African immigration to the United States has enriched American life, created opportunities for mobility, and fostered dreams. However, the promise of the American dream has been threatened by the embrace of anti-immigrant policies and persistent anti-Black racism. This book talk was moderated by Ibrahim Hirsi, PhD candidate in immigration history at UMN.
View the recording HERE.
This webinar focused on how the international community responded to climate change and related migration. Panelists Sumudu Atapattu and Yael Schacher explored how has the US responded, and what can be done to better prepare for and respond to climate migration and what human rights violations result from climate change related migration. Sarah Brenes, Binger Center for New Americans and Michele Waslin, Immigrant History Research Center moderated the conversation.
Migration scholars come from many different academic disciplines and find rewarding work both in academia and in other sectors. Navigating the non-academic job market can be difficult and confusing. This webinar, held Feb. 15, 2023 and moderated by IHRC Assistant Director Michele Waslin, brought together three migration historians who discussed their career paths in the nonprofit and for-profit sectors. Featuring: Chantel Rodriguez, Senior Public Historian, MN Historical Society; Elizabeth Venditto, Director of Institutional Giving, Museum of Jewish Heritage; and Phil Wolgin, Principal, US Immigration Policy, Amazon.
View recording here.
On November 10, IHRC Director Dr. Erika Lee joined Drs. Maddalena Marinari, Ashley Bavery, Kevin Kenny, Carl Lindskoog, Mireya Loza, and Yael Schacher in a discussion of immigration restriction past and present. The event was organized by the Organization of American Historians (OAH) and co-sponsored by the IHRC. The recording is now available here.
On October 11, IHRC's Director Erika Lee participated in a conversation at the Tenement Museum on understanding anti-immigrant ideas, past and present. Other panelists were Shauna Siggelkow of Define American and Kathryn Lloyd of the Tenement Museum. The recording is now available on YouTube.
This webinar presented new research on the increased risk of exposure for immigrants to COVID-19 in the workplace. View the Immigrant Essential Workers event.
The participants of this event highlighted activist and artistic practices that reimagine borders, migration, and mobility and that work toward a more just future. View the Futurity event.
What are borders, what do they do, and whom do they serve? Borders tend to be created and justified as a response to a crisis, but how do they exacerbate and produce crises and function as zones of exception? View the Borders as Violence event.
This critical conversation brought together members of the Migration Scholars Collaborative who spoke to the ongoing crisis of asylum and refuge in the United States. View the Refuge, Asylum, Violence event.
This panel brought together three advocates and leaders from Minnesota’s Black, immigrant, and refugee communities to discuss their work advancing equity and justice during the pandemic. View the Stories from the Pandemic event.
Author Adam Goodman (University of Illinois at Chicago) joined Professor Jimmy Patiño (UMN Chicano & Latino Studies) and IHRC Director Erika Lee to discuss his award-winning book. View The Deportation Machine event.
This panel brought together adoption scholars Kim Park Nelson, Kit Myers and Eleana Kim, as well as adoptee rights legal expert Gregory Luce, to discuss how federal immigration policy impacts transnational adoptees and shapes their national, cultural, and familial belonging. View the Adoptee Deportee event.
This event featured Elliott Young, Professor of History at Lewis & Clark College, and focused on his book, Forever Prisoners: How the United States Made the World's Largest Immigrant Detention System. He was joined by Director of the Detainee Rights Clinic (UMN Law School) Linus Chan and IHRC Director Erika Lee. View the Immigrant Detention event.
The Immigration History Research Center and the International Rescue Committee celebrated the launch of award-winning author Kao Kalia Yang's book Somewhere in the Unknown World: A Collective Refugee Memoir (Metropolitan Books, 2020.) View the book launch.
Dara Lind, one of the nation's leading immigration reporters from ProPublica in Washington, DC, was joined by the IHRC and journalist Ibrahim Hirsi to discuss immigration news reporting during the 2020 election year. This event was moderated by Ibrahim Hirsi and IHRC Director Erika Lee. View Covering Immigration in an Election Year.