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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

I am a historian of race, empire, borders, carceral studies, and climate migration in the modern US and World. Detention Empire originated in doctoral dissertation research at UC Irvine that I embarked upon in the wake of my former husband Andi's deportation in 2007. For over a decade, I have studied in solidarity with people harmed by borders and prisons, and communities working to dismantle them. This book is dedicated to them.

I am the Director of Public History at UNC Charlotte, and creator of the digital history project Climate Refugee Stories. As a Soros Justice Fellow at Freedom for Immigrants in 2016-18, I founded the detention stories archive IMM Print.

Working to disrupt the silences of privilege surrounding the cultural and material inheritances of descendants of settlers and enslavers such as myself, a fourth-generation Angeleno, I now live on Catawba, Sugeree, and Waxhaw land (Charlotte, NC) with my husband Craig and our two small dogs. I also work to make Detention Empire free and accessible to people who are incarcerated, and donate a portion of all royalties from Detention Empire to the National Bail Fund Network. View more of my work here on my personal website.