My scholarship takes two intertwined paths. The first addresses the ways in which Japanese women’s inclusion in the US was facilitated by American interests in the Pacific. This line of inquiry ultimately seeks to understand the ways in which gender and sexuality shaped US empire in the Pacific vis-à-vis intimacy and immigration. The second path my research has taken explores the historical, social, and political developments that linked Japanese and African American people and communities over time. This path is situated at the intersection of Asian American and African American history often categorized under Afro-Asian studies.

I began my intellectual journey at Antelope Valley College, a community college in Lancaster, CA where I grew up. I took classes part-time for several years while working as a licensed esthetician and raising a family. In 2008, I completed an Associate of Arts degree, becoming the first in my family to earn a college degree. I transferred to the University of California, Berkeley soon after earning a B.A. in history before completing a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Before joining SCU, I was a predoctoral fellow at MIT and a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University’s Mahindra Humanities Center.