Natalia Molina is an American historian and Distinguished Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity at the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in C ...

. She is the author of ''Fit To Be Citizens? Public Health and Race in Los Angeles, 1879-1939,'' ''How Race Is Made in America: Immigration, Citizenship, and the Historical Power of Racial Scripts, and A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community''. In 2019, Molina co-edited a series of essays on the formation of race in the United States, ''Relational Formations of Race: Theory, Method, and Practice'', in collaboration with Daniel Martínez Hosang and Ramón Gutiérrez. She has also published numerous articles in scholarly journals and contributes

op-eds An op-ed, short for "opposite the editorial page", is a written prose piece, typically published by a North-American newspaper or magazine, which expresses the opinion of an author usually not affiliated with the publication's editorial board. ...

in nationally circulated newspapers. She received a 2020

MacArthur Fellowship The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the MacArthur Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to ...

for her work on race and citizenship.

Education and employment

Molina received her B.A. from the

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

and double-majored in History and Women's Studies. She later received and her M.A. and Ph.D. from the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

, after which she joined the

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...

faculty. After earning tenure and serving in various faculty and administrative roles at UCSD, in 2018 she joined the faculty of the Department of American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California in 2018.

Research

Molina studies the intersections of

race Race, RACE or "The Race" may refer to: * Race (biology), an informal taxonomic classification within a species, generally within a sub-species * Race (human categorization), classification of humans into groups based on physical traits, and/or s ...

gender Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...

culture Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups.Tyl ...

, and

citizenship Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...

. Her scholarship has been described as "an exciting contribution to the growing body of scholarship that knits the history of medicine and public health more tightly into the fabric of the American past..." and as making an “important contribution to the literature on the histories of public health, race, labor, and urban planning by demonstrating the magnitude of public health officials‘ influence on city policy and planning and on the development of racial hierarchies”. In 2007, Molina won the PCB- American Historical Association's Norris and Carol Hundley Award for her first book, ''Fit to be Citizens? Public Health and Race in Los Angeles, 1879–1939''.

''Fit to Be Citizens?: Public Health and Race in Los Angeles, 1879-1940'' (2006)

''How Race Is Made in America'' (2013)

Molina's 2013 book ''How Race Is Made in America: Immigration, Citizenship, and the Historical Power of Racial Scripts'' examines Mexican immigration to the United States. Focusing on the years between 1924-1965, Molina argues that during this time period an immigration regime emerged that would define racial categories in the U.S., such as

Mexican American Mexican Americans ( es, mexicano-estadounidenses, , or ) are Americans of full or partial Mexican heritage. In 2019, Mexican Americans comprised 11.3% of the US population and 61.5% of all Hispanic and Latino Americans. In 2019, 71% of Mexica ...

, that persist in current perceptions of race and ethnicity. ''How Race Is Made in America'' shows how racial scripts are easily adopted and adapted to apply to different racial groups. The book's argument connects the experiences of different racialized groups by showing how and when they intersect as racial categories are constituted in American society.

''Relational Formations of Race: Theory, Method, and Practice'' (Co-editor, 2019)

''A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community'' (2022)

Molina's 2022 book ''A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community'', offers a history of the Nayarit, a Mexican restaurant in

Echo Park Echo Park is a neighborhood in the east-central region of Los Angeles, California. Located to the northwest of Downtown, it is bordered by Silver Lake to the west and Chinatown to the east. The culturally diverse neighborhood has become known fo ...

formerly owned by her grandmother, Doña Natalia Barraza. The restaurant's original location was near Boyle Heights, although it relocated to Echo Park in 1951. In this work, Molina demonstrates that working people and ethnic Mexican residents in Los Angeles fundamentally shaped public spaces in the urban landscape. She further asserts that restaurants can "serve as social spaces that shape the neighborhoods in which they are located." Molina will donate all 2022 proceeds from the book to No Us Without You, a

501c3 A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 501 ...

organization which offers food security resources to undocumented immigrants in the greater Los Angeles area.

Forthcoming Work: ''The Silent Hands that Shaped the Huntington: A History of Its Mexican Workers''

Recognition

In October 2020, Molina received a 2020

. The citation noted her work connecting historical racial narratives about immigration to current policy debates.

Awards

* 2007: PCB-American Historical Association's Norris and Carol Hundley Award * 2020: MacArthur Foundation "Genius Grant" Fellowship

Selected works

* ''Fit To Be Citizens? Public Health and Race in Los Angeles, 1879-1939.'' University of California Press, 2006 * ''How Race Is Made in America: Immigration, Citizenship, and the Historical Power of Racial Scripts'', University of California Press, 2013

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Molina, Natalia Living people American women historians 21st-century American women writers 21st-century American historians MacArthur Fellows University of Southern California faculty University of California, Los Angeles alumni University of Michigan alumni Year of birth missing (living people) Historians from California