In this spring’s Stevenson College Distinguished Faculty Lecture, Lisbeth Haas, Professor of History and Feminist Studies at UCSC, discusses twentieth-century economic and demographic shifts in the Blue Ridge Mountain town of Hillsville, Virginia, home to her mother and a growing Mexican population.

In this talk, Lisbeth Haas, Professor of History and Feminist Studies, discusses her search for her mother, Imogene, in Hillsville, Virginia.  World War II brought intense industrialization to this Appalachian hamlet, but by 2000, many factories had shuttered.  At the same time, Hillsville emerged as a destination for migrants from Mexico.  Situating Imogene within a crossroads of global processes, Professor Haas discusses the politics of motherhood and women’s power in the Blue Ridge Mountain region during the height of its industrialization in the 1950s.

Lisbeth Haas is Professor of History and Feminist Studies at UCSC.  In addition to being Imogene’s daughter, she is the author of numerous publications.  Her most recent books are Saints and Citizens:  Indigenous Histories of Colonial Missions and Mexican California, 1750-1850 (University of California Press, 2014) and Pablo Tac, Indigenous Scholar (University of California Press, 2011).