The rise of nativist or nationalist movements in many countries and the closing of borders to migrants seeking refuge from persecution, war, and violence calls into question the world historical context of migration, borders, and political belonging. This conference queries citizenship and borders across time and region to make sense of their implications for citizens, non-citizens , subjects, refugees, and exiles in world history. We welcome broad definitions of “border,” “citizenship,” and “migration”to include boundaries that migrate even when people themselves do not, citizenships that are defined by entities other than the state, and migrations that don’t require physical movement (eg. movement among identities that can affect citizenship, like race or religion).

Graduate Student Conference hosted by: The UCSC Center for World History Program

Committee: Daniel Joesten, Muiris MacGiollabhui, Jackie Schultz, Crystal Smith

8:30–9:00 Opening Remarks, Coffee, and Pastries

9:00-10:30 Panel One: “Religion, Migration, and the Politics of Citizenship”

Chair: Crystal E. Smith

• Jeffrey Turner (University of Utah) – “Polygamy, Race, and Religion in the 1891 Immigration Act”
• Robin Keller (University of California, Santa Cruz) – “‘The Only Foreigners We Felt Sorry For:’ Holocaust Refugees and Border Control in World War II Shanghai”
• Shimul Chowdhury (University of California, Santa Cruz) – “Stitching Solidarity: Collaborative Craft and the Muslim Identity”

10:45-12:15 Panel Two: “Identity, Family, and the State”

Chair: Jaclyn N. Schultz

• Selena Moon (Independent Scholar) – “ Sexism and Racism in U.S. and Japanese Citizenship Laws ”
• Emma Bellino (University of Wollongong) – “From Citizen to Alien to Citizen Again: Married Women’s Dependent Nationality in Australia, 1920-1948 ”
• Karina Ruiz (University of California, Santa Cruz) – “Cleavages of the State: Legal geographies in the U.S.”

12:15-1:15 Lunch

1:15- 2:45 Panel Three: “Exile and Banishment across Borders”

Chair: Muiris MacGiollabhuí

• Daisy Munoz (San Francisco State University) – “Viva Reagan: Cuban Republican Partisanship in 1980 & 1984”
• Kevan Aguilar (University of California, San Diego) – “‘Cárdenas was Calling Us:’ Race, Class, and Settlement in Mexican & Spanish Exile Imaginaries”
• Lily Hindy (University of California, Los Angeles) – “Reconsidering Home: Syrian Refugees, Emigrés, and Exiles Confront a New National Identity”

3:00-4:15 Panel Four: “Culture, Ethnicity, and Nationalism”

Chair: Daniel Joesten

• Hardeep Dhillon (Harvard University) – “‘Popularly Understood ’ : U.S. Naturalization in the Early Twentieth Century ”
• Amelia Flood (St. Louis University) – “Marooned on American Shores: Migrating Between Citizen and Subject in the U.S. Virgin Islands.”
• Alberto Ganis (University of California, Santa Cruz) – “Sub-State Nationalisms and the Other(s) : The Mediated Identities of Friuli”

4:30-6 Keynote

Harry Nii Koney Odamtten (Santa Clara University Associate Professor of Africa and Atlantic History) – “Edward W. Blyden: The Afropolitan Dreams of an Atlantic Denizen”

Co-sponsored by: Center for Jewish Studies, Cowell College, UCSC History Department, and our generous donors from UCSC Giving Day!