Center for the History of the New America

See the latest list of Immigrant Studies Courses available for Fall 2013 here.

WHO ARE WE?

The Center for the History of the New America aims to make the University of Maryland the hub for understanding the long immigration history of this country, from 1500 to the present, and its connections to world history.

The Center will provide a distinctive institutional home for interdisciplinary and trans-national research, for training faculty and students, and for distributing information about the history of the immigrant experience to a broad public.

If you are interested in the study, the teaching, and the politics of the long history of immigration from a global perspective and want to learn more about The Center for the History of the New America at the University of Maryland you are in the right place!

Announcements, News, and Upcoming Events

Forum on Race, Immigration, and Representation

The University of Maryland's Asian American Studies Program will be hosting a forum on Thursday, May 9th from 3:30 to 5:30pm in the Juan Ramon Jimenez Room (Room 2208) in the Stamp Student Union at the University of Maryland at College Park. It seeks to bring scholars from a range of disciplines together to discuss key questions related to race, migration, and representation today. Featured speakers include Jonathan Inda (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Latino Studies), Christine So (Georgetown University, English and American Studies) and Erin Chung (John Hopkins University, Political Science) (invited). Andrew Mayton (English and Asian American Studies Undergraduate) will provide comments.

Migration Stories

On April 25th from 3:30 to 5:30pm, students in the "Creating Museums of the Immigrant Experience" course at the University of Maryland will host a program called "Immigrants Share their Experiences: A Conversation." Through videos that students created, immigrants living in Prince George's County will share their life histories. The program is in English but Spanish and French will be available. NO RSVP is needed. Refreshments will be provided. The event will take place at the CASA de Maryland Multicultural Center, 8151 15th Avenue, Hyatsville, MD 20783.

Forum on Race, Immigration, and Action

The University of Maryland Asian American Studies Program hosted a forum on race, immigration, and action on Thursday, March 7th from 12:30 to 2:30 p.m. in the Jimenez Room in Stamp Hall (Room 2208).

Workshop on Basic Immigration Law

The Graduate Student Legal Aid Office will be hosting a workshop with immigration attorney Patricia Minikon on Tuesday, February 19th, from 12:30-1:30pm in the Stamp Union, Pyon Su Room 2108. She will discuss immigration issues affecting the graduate student community, such as student visas, immigration options in the future, and more. Sign up here.

Forum on Immigration and the 2012 Election

Talk on Black Immigrants

The African American Studies Department sponsored a talk on November 12 by Dr. Kevin Thomas from Pennsylvania State University on "Highly skilled Black immigrants in low-skilled jobs: Implications for child poverty disparities in immigrant families." Click here (pdf) for additional information.

Forum on Immigration and the 2012 Election

The Center sponsored a forum on October 23rd at 4pm at the Nyumburu Cultural Center on campus. Participants included UMD President Wallace Loh and Maryland State Senator Victor Ramirez. Various issues related to immigration such as the DREAM Act were discussed. For more information, please check out The Diamondback's coverage and go to the forum's webpage, which includes complete video.

Diamondback Covers the Center

The Diamondback, UMD's student newspaper, wrote about the Center's involvement in a "cluster hire" - hiring five new professors across the University who will be associated with Center.

"Diversity on the Ballot"

Along with the LGBT Equity Center at UMD, Equality Maryland, and various other groups, the Center co-sponsored this panel discussion on October 1st about two referendum items that will be on the ballot this November in Maryland.

Fall Film Series Beginning

On October 1st, the Center held a viewing for the first film in our series, Mississippi Masala. The next showing will be In and Out of Africa, on October 17th. Check out our film series page for more information.

Immigration and Entrepreneurship: An Interdisciplinary Conference

The conference took place on September 13 and 14, 2012 and was a great success. For more details, click here.

A New History Course on Immigration

HIST 429T, Special Topics in History: Immigration and Ethnicity in Modern Latin America, taught by Professor Beatrice D. Gurwitz, will explore the importance of immigration and ethnicity in the making of modern Latin American nations, focusing on immigrants who arrived in the 19th and 20th centuries from Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, and their descendents.