2008 Fellowships

Summer Graduate Student Fellows

Myrna García (Ethnic Studies) earned her B.A. in Latin American Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). At UIUC, she worked to institutionalize Latina/Latino Studies. Today she continues her commitment by serving on the Board of Directors of the Latina/Latino Alumni Association. She will earn her doctorate in Ethnic Studies at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). Her dissertation, Creating and Contesting “Sin Fronteras” Imaginings: Identity, Community, and Mexican Immigration, 1968-1986 investigates how the influx of Mexican immigration during the 1970s shaped the social dynamics of identity and community formation in the history of ethnic Mexicans in Chicago. By studying the activism of "El Centro de Acción Social y Autonomo- Hermandad General de Trabajadores" (CASA), she explores key questions about immigrant rights, community and identity formation in the neighborhoods of Pilsen and Little Village. As a first generation college student herself, she is committed to supporting students in their academic goals. At UCSD, García co-founded Raza Graduate Student Association, a campus organization for Latina/o graduate students across disciplines. García also has experience and training in the field of education. She earned a M.S. in Education: Administration & Supervision at Fordham University. For example, she was a public school teacher, staff professional developer, and a school director in New York City. She was also a youth coordinator at Gads Hill Center in Chicago, where she currently serves on a scholarship committee.

Michelle Gutiérrez (Ethnic Studies) is a 7th graduate student in the department of Ethnic Studies. She received her B.A. in Sociology at Bowling Green State University in Ohio in 2001 and her M.A. in Ethnic Studies in 2005. Currently, she is working on her dissertation project, which explores the multiple forms of militarization experienced and engaged by Mexican/Mexican American women in San Diego, CA. Since 2004, Michelle has served on the Advisory Board for the Project on Youth and Nonmilitary Opportunities (Project YANO), a group that spreads education about alternatives to the military to youth here in San Diego. She has also been a regular contributor to the publication Draft Notices, a quarterly newsletter focused on issues of militarism.

Angie Morrill (Ethnic Studies) is a Ph.D. candidate in the Ethnic Studies Department. She is currently working on her dissertation, tracing gendered manifestations of sovereignty in the last half of the twentieth century. Her research engages indigeneity, violence and decolonization.Jimmy Patino, a native of Houston, Texas, is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of History at the University of California, San Diego working with co-advisors Professors Luis Alvarez and David G. Gutiérrez. His larger dissertation tentatively entitled, "A Time for Resistance": Globalization, Undocumented Immigration, and the Chicano Movement in the San Diego Borderlands, demonstrates that beginning in the 1920s, and highlighting the "Chicano movement" of the 1960s and 70s, a number of activists responded to the vexing issue of undocumented immigration by forging a conception of community across differences in nationality (American and Mexican) and citizenship status (U.S. citizens and Mexican immigrants). In addition, Patiño has interests in black-brown relations, comparative racial and ethnic studies on the American continent, Latinas/os in the U.S. South, hip-hop and youth culture, and movements for social change. Outside of academia he can be found playing airplanes with his 4-year-old son, Jimmy III, reading books to his 2-year-old daughter, LunaBella, listening to Latin Jazz with his life partner, Nova, and watching Yao Ming and the Houston Rockets.

L. Chase Smith (Literature) is a fourth year graduate student in the cultural studies section of the Literature Department. Her research examines the circulation of ideas of progress and vice in California, the U.S.-Mexico border, and Hawai'i during the Progressive Era.

Ma Vang (Ethnic Studies) is a Ph.D. candidate in the department of Ethnic Studies at UC San Diego. Her dissertation, "The Refugee Soldier Figure: Hmong, Statelessness, Nation," proposes to rethink the refugee as a troubling moral political figure, through centralizing statelessness, to open up the categories of nation and citizenship. In doing so, Ms. Vang's research explores how the configuration of refugee and stateless status signify the crisis that threatens the nation-state through a study of the US’s convoluted response to several emerging and urgent issues within the Hmong refugee/American community, such as the veterans’ naturalization legislation and the naming of Hmong as terrorists.Dr. Edwina Welch has served as the Director of the UCSD Cross-Cultural Center since spring of 1996. In this capacity she works with students, staff and faculty on issues of climate and multiculturalism for UC San Diego and the surrounding San Diego community. Welch has also dose extensive training to staff and student organizations at UC San Diego. Edwina also works in the San Diego Community as a "Working Group Member for Civil Society" at the San Diego Foundation our region wide community foundation. Edwina received her BA in Communication Studies and Business Administration from California State University Sacramento, a Master's of Science in Higher Education Administration from the University of Oregon and her Doctorate of Education from a joint program with UC San Diego, San Diego State University, and the California State University at San Marcos. Edwina is a founding member of the California Council for Cultural Centers in Higher Education (CaCCCHE) a regional wide collaborative of higher education cultural centers. Her research and specialty areas include social justice training and practice, retention and campus climate issues, organizational capacity building, and small group communication.

Dr. Edwina Welch (Ed.D in Education Studies) has served as the Director of the UCSD Cross-Cultural Center since spring of 1996. In this capacity she works with students, staff and faculty on issues of climate and multiculturalism for UC San Diego and the surrounding San Diego community. Welch has also dose extensive training to staff and student organizations at UC San Diego. Edwina also works in the San Diego Community as a "Working Group Member for Civil Society" at the San Diego Foundation our region wide community foundation. Edwina received her BA in Communication Studies and Business Administration from California State University Sacramento, a Master's of Science in Higher Education Administration from the University of Oregon and her Doctorate of Education from a joint program with UC San Diego, San Diego State University, and the California State University at San Marcos. Edwina is a founding member of the California Council for Cultural Centers in Higher Education (CaCCCHE) a regional wide collaborative of higher education cultural centers. Her research and specialty areas include social justice training and practice, retention and campus climate issues, organizational capacity building, and small group communication.