Natalia Molina
Biographic Data
| ID | 528613 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Natalia Molina |
| GIVEN NAMES | Natalia |
| FAMILY NAME | Molina |
| SIGNATURE | MOLINA N |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of California San Diego |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3578-316X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 19 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 42 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 18 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2003 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Love, study, struggle
This essay argues that George Lipsitz’s Ethnic Studies at the Crossroads is a model for how Ethnic Studies is a project of what Robin D. G. Kelley sums up as “love, study, struggle.” I organize the essay around these three concepts, to show how Lipsitz models each in his scholarship and practice. In the section on love, drawing on my experiences as Lipsitz’s former colleague, I show how the book’s arguments are inseparable from the scholarly prac…
Race as a Relational Theory
Relational Formations of Race
How Race Is Made in America
How Race Is Made in America examines Mexican Americans—from 1924, when American law drastically reduced immigration into the United States, to 1965, when many quotas were abolished—to understand how broad themes of race and citizenship are constructed. These years shaped the emergence of what Natalia Molina describes as an immigration regime , which defined the racial categories that continue to influence perceptions in the United States about Me…
Understanding Race as a Relational Concept
In November 2016, just a few days after the presidential election, Carl Higbie, a spokesman for a super PAC that supported Donald Trump, told Fox News host Megyn Kelly that the new Trump administration was considering a national registry for Muslims in the United States. Higbie argued that the proposal was legal and would "hold constitutional muster," and went on to point out that there was precedent for singling out groups based on their race an…
Writing Significant Scholarship, Helping Others, and Making an Impact in Your Field
George J. Sánchez has modeled a new paradigm in his work with the almost one hundred undergraduate and graduate students he has mentored over the years. This article discusses the lessons I have learned from his scholarship and career over the years, lessons that I now share with my own students. In particular, his example challenges us to build and strengthen relationships with communities outside the academy, broaden our definitions of scholars…
Fear and Loathing in the US-Mexico Borderlands
This article asks why disease is such a powerful trope in the racialization of Mexicans, particularly when they are already stigmatized in such persistent and pernicious ways, such as being synonymous with the term illegal. I argue that the answer lies partly in the fact that it has proven impossible to enforce an airtight US-Mexico border. As such, invoking the image of Mexicans as the "other" helps to construct social and cultural internal bord…
Latinos at the Golden Gate
Book Review| April 01 2015 Latinos at the Golden Gate: Creating Community & Identity in San Francisco Latinos at the Golden Gate: Creating Community & Identity in San Francisco. By Tomás F. Summers Sandoval, Jr. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2013. 256 pp. $39.95 (cloth). Natalia Molina Natalia Molina Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Journal of American Ethnic History (2015) 34 (3): 119–121. https://doi…
Chicano/a History
This article surveys the writing of Chicano/a history since its inception and reflects on why scholars have been concerned with certain issues and how they have written about them. Born from the tumult of the Vietnam era, the field has challenged the status quo and emboldened those communities from which Chicano/a historians come and which they ultimately serve. Given the generation-long development of Mexican American history, this article focus…
Examining Chicana/o History through a Relational Lens
This article argues that we should examine Chicana/os in relation to other racialized groups in order to develop a fuller understanding of how racial categories form and operate. The article highlights different models of relational work by examining key works in Chicana/o history that have employed such a relational methodology. In addition, the article demonstrates how we can use organizing principles besides race to find links between racializ…
Borders, Laborers, and Racialized Medicalization Mexican Immigration and US Public Health Practices in the 20th Century
Throughout the 20th century, US public health and immigration policies intersected with and informed one another in the country's response to Mexican immigration. Three historical episodes illustrate how perceived racial differences influenced disease diagnosis: a 1916 typhus outbreak, the midcentury Bracero Program, and medical deportations that are taking place today. Disease, or just the threat of it, marked Mexicans as foreign, just as much a…
Constructing Mexicans as Deportable Immigrants
This article draws on archival records of events in California's Imperial Valley in 1940 that resulted in the arrests and deportation of a group of Mexican workers, some of whom were known union activists. The workers had entered the country lawfully and had lived in the United States for years. These immigrants were nevertheless vulnerable because they were receiving treatment for a communicable disease. This, according to immigration officials,…
The power of racial scripts
In a Race All Their Own
This article traces challenges to Mexicans' legal and racial status by various groups, including federal bureaucrats, nativist organizations, and everyday citizens. Early twentieth-century efforts to make Mexicans ineligible for U.S. citizenship, despite provisions in the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, focused on the premise that Mexicans were neither "black" nor "white"; interest groups and politicians both strove instead to categorize Mexicans as…
The Battle for Los Angeles
The Battle for Los Angeles: Racial Ideology and World War II Get access The Battle for Los Angeles: Racial Ideology and World War II. By Leonard Kevin Allen. (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2006. xii + 360 pp. Illustrations, notes, index, $34.95.) Natalia Molina Natalia Molina University of California, San Diego Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Western Historical Quarterly, Volume 39, Issue 1,…
Racial Transformations
Moving beyond the black-white binary that has long framed racial discourse in the United States, the contributors to this collection examine how the experiences of Latinos and Asians intersect in the formation of the U.S. nation-state. They analyze the political and social processes that have racialized Latinos and Asians while highlighting the productive ways that these communities challenge and transform the identities imposed on them. Each ess…
Medicalizing the Mexican
Research Article| January 01 2006 Medicalizing the Mexican: Immigration, Race, and Disability in the Early-Twentieth-Century United States Natalia Molina Natalia Molina Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Radical History Review (2006) 2006 (94): 22–37. https://doi.org/10.1215/01636545-2006-94-22 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Twitter Permissions Search Site Citation Natalia Molina; Medicalizing the Mexican: Immigration, Ra…
In the Name of Public Health
Illustrating Cultural Authority
Research Article| November 01 2003 Illustrating Cultural Authority :Medicalized Representations of Mexican Communities in Early-Twentieth-Century Los Angeles Natalia Molina Natalia Molina Natalia Molina, assistant professor of ethnic studies at the University of California at San Diego, is writing a book titled Fit to Be Citizens? Public Health Policies and Discourses in Ethnic Los Angeles, 1879-1940. Search for other works by this author on: Thi…
Borders, Laborers, and Racialized Medicalization Mexican Immigration and US Public Health Practices in the 20th Century
Throughout the 20th century, US public health and immigration policies intersected with and informed one another in the country's response to Mexican immigration. Three historical episodes illustrate how perceived racial differences influenced disease diagnosis: a 1916 typhus outbreak, the midcentury Bracero Program, and medical deportations that are taking place today. Disease, or just the threat of it, marked Mexicans as foreign, just as much a…
In a Race All Their Own
This article traces challenges to Mexicans' legal and racial status by various groups, including federal bureaucrats, nativist organizations, and everyday citizens. Early twentieth-century efforts to make Mexicans ineligible for U.S. citizenship, despite provisions in the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, focused on the premise that Mexicans were neither "black" nor "white"; interest groups and politicians both strove instead to categorize Mexicans as…
The power of racial scripts
How Race Is Made in America
How Race Is Made in America examines Mexican Americans—from 1924, when American law drastically reduced immigration into the United States, to 1965, when many quotas were abolished—to understand how broad themes of race and citizenship are constructed. These years shaped the emergence of what Natalia Molina describes as an immigration regime , which defined the racial categories that continue to influence perceptions in the United States about Me…
Examining Chicana/o History through a Relational Lens
This article argues that we should examine Chicana/os in relation to other racialized groups in order to develop a fuller understanding of how racial categories form and operate. The article highlights different models of relational work by examining key works in Chicana/o history that have employed such a relational methodology. In addition, the article demonstrates how we can use organizing principles besides race to find links between racializ…
Chicano/a History
This article surveys the writing of Chicano/a history since its inception and reflects on why scholars have been concerned with certain issues and how they have written about them. Born from the tumult of the Vietnam era, the field has challenged the status quo and emboldened those communities from which Chicano/a historians come and which they ultimately serve. Given the generation-long development of Mexican American history, this article focus…
Medicalizing the Mexican
Research Article| January 01 2006 Medicalizing the Mexican: Immigration, Race, and Disability in the Early-Twentieth-Century United States Natalia Molina Natalia Molina Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Radical History Review (2006) 2006 (94): 22–37. https://doi.org/10.1215/01636545-2006-94-22 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Twitter Permissions Search Site Citation Natalia Molina; Medicalizing the Mexican: Immigration, Ra…
In the Name of Public Health
Illustrating Cultural Authority
Research Article| November 01 2003 Illustrating Cultural Authority :Medicalized Representations of Mexican Communities in Early-Twentieth-Century Los Angeles Natalia Molina Natalia Molina Natalia Molina, assistant professor of ethnic studies at the University of California at San Diego, is writing a book titled Fit to Be Citizens? Public Health Policies and Discourses in Ethnic Los Angeles, 1879-1940. Search for other works by this author on: Thi…
In the Name of Public Health
Racial Transformations
Moving beyond the black-white binary that has long framed racial discourse in the United States, the contributors to this collection examine how the experiences of Latinos and Asians intersect in the formation of the U.S. nation-state. They analyze the political and social processes that have racialized Latinos and Asians while highlighting the productive ways that these communities challenge and transform the identities imposed on them. Each ess…
Medicalizing the Mexican
Research Article| January 01 2006 Medicalizing the Mexican: Immigration, Race, and Disability in the Early-Twentieth-Century United States Natalia Molina Natalia Molina Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Radical History Review (2006) 2006 (94): 22–37. https://doi.org/10.1215/01636545-2006-94-22 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Twitter Permissions Search Site Citation Natalia Molina; Medicalizing the Mexican: Immigration, Ra…
The Battle for Los Angeles
The Battle for Los Angeles: Racial Ideology and World War II Get access The Battle for Los Angeles: Racial Ideology and World War II. By Leonard Kevin Allen. (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2006. xii + 360 pp. Illustrations, notes, index, $34.95.) Natalia Molina Natalia Molina University of California, San Diego Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Western Historical Quarterly, Volume 39, Issue 1,…
Constructing Mexicans as Deportable Immigrants
This article draws on archival records of events in California's Imperial Valley in 1940 that resulted in the arrests and deportation of a group of Mexican workers, some of whom were known union activists. The workers had entered the country lawfully and had lived in the United States for years. These immigrants were nevertheless vulnerable because they were receiving treatment for a communicable disease. This, according to immigration officials,…
The power of racial scripts
In a Race All Their Own
This article traces challenges to Mexicans' legal and racial status by various groups, including federal bureaucrats, nativist organizations, and everyday citizens. Early twentieth-century efforts to make Mexicans ineligible for U.S. citizenship, despite provisions in the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, focused on the premise that Mexicans were neither "black" nor "white"; interest groups and politicians both strove instead to categorize Mexicans as…
Borders, Laborers, and Racialized Medicalization Mexican Immigration and US Public Health Practices in the 20th Century
Throughout the 20th century, US public health and immigration policies intersected with and informed one another in the country's response to Mexican immigration. Three historical episodes illustrate how perceived racial differences influenced disease diagnosis: a 1916 typhus outbreak, the midcentury Bracero Program, and medical deportations that are taking place today. Disease, or just the threat of it, marked Mexicans as foreign, just as much a…
Chicano/a History
This article surveys the writing of Chicano/a history since its inception and reflects on why scholars have been concerned with certain issues and how they have written about them. Born from the tumult of the Vietnam era, the field has challenged the status quo and emboldened those communities from which Chicano/a historians come and which they ultimately serve. Given the generation-long development of Mexican American history, this article focus…
Examining Chicana/o History through a Relational Lens
This article argues that we should examine Chicana/os in relation to other racialized groups in order to develop a fuller understanding of how racial categories form and operate. The article highlights different models of relational work by examining key works in Chicana/o history that have employed such a relational methodology. In addition, the article demonstrates how we can use organizing principles besides race to find links between racializ…
Latinos at the Golden Gate
Book Review| April 01 2015 Latinos at the Golden Gate: Creating Community & Identity in San Francisco Latinos at the Golden Gate: Creating Community & Identity in San Francisco. By Tomás F. Summers Sandoval, Jr. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2013. 256 pp. $39.95 (cloth). Natalia Molina Natalia Molina Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Journal of American Ethnic History (2015) 34 (3): 119–121. https://doi…
Fear and Loathing in the US-Mexico Borderlands
This article asks why disease is such a powerful trope in the racialization of Mexicans, particularly when they are already stigmatized in such persistent and pernicious ways, such as being synonymous with the term illegal. I argue that the answer lies partly in the fact that it has proven impossible to enforce an airtight US-Mexico border. As such, invoking the image of Mexicans as the "other" helps to construct social and cultural internal bord…
Writing Significant Scholarship, Helping Others, and Making an Impact in Your Field
George J. Sánchez has modeled a new paradigm in his work with the almost one hundred undergraduate and graduate students he has mentored over the years. This article discusses the lessons I have learned from his scholarship and career over the years, lessons that I now share with my own students. In particular, his example challenges us to build and strengthen relationships with communities outside the academy, broaden our definitions of scholars…
Understanding Race as a Relational Concept
In November 2016, just a few days after the presidential election, Carl Higbie, a spokesman for a super PAC that supported Donald Trump, told Fox News host Megyn Kelly that the new Trump administration was considering a national registry for Muslims in the United States. Higbie argued that the proposal was legal and would "hold constitutional muster," and went on to point out that there was precedent for singling out groups based on their race an…
Race as a Relational Theory
Relational Formations of Race
How Race Is Made in America
How Race Is Made in America examines Mexican Americans—from 1924, when American law drastically reduced immigration into the United States, to 1965, when many quotas were abolished—to understand how broad themes of race and citizenship are constructed. These years shaped the emergence of what Natalia Molina describes as an immigration regime , which defined the racial categories that continue to influence perceptions in the United States about Me…
Love, study, struggle
This essay argues that George Lipsitz’s Ethnic Studies at the Crossroads is a model for how Ethnic Studies is a project of what Robin D. G. Kelley sums up as “love, study, struggle.” I organize the essay around these three concepts, to show how Lipsitz models each in his scholarship and practice. In the section on love, drawing on my experiences as Lipsitz’s former colleague, I show how the book’s arguments are inseparable from the scholarly prac…
Sociology (17 works) · Gender Studies (12 works) · Latin American and Latino Studies (10 works) · Political science (9 works) · Computer Science (7 works) · Race (biology) (7 works) · Race, History, and American Society (7 works) · Ethnic group (6 works) · History (6 works) · Law (6 works)