Kendra Taira Field Acting Assistant Professor of History Ph.D., expected from New York University 2010 kendra.field@ucr.edu

Kendra Taira Field grew up in and around New York City and with family in Oklahoma, Missouri, and Canada.  Before coming to UCR, she spent a year in New England as the Charles Eastman Fellow in Native American Studies at Dartmouth College.  Her current project narrates the migration and settlement of African Americans from the Deep South to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) after the Civil War, as well as subsequent migrations to Mexico and West Africa.  This project is a family history, tracing several families who made this journey, including her own ancestors; it relies heavily on oral testimony and storytelling, exploring movement towards freedom and the expansion of U.S. empire.  She has assistant edited David Levering Lewis' single-volume biography of W.E.B. Du Bois (Henry Holt, 2009) and has presented papers throughout the United States and Canada.  Her recent awards include the 2009 Huggins-Quarles Award of the Organization of American Historians and a Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowship.  A doctoral candidate at New York University, Kendra also holds a Master's in Public Policy from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government and a B.A. from Williams College.  Prior to pursuing her doctorate, she spent five years working in education and public policy in New York City and listening to family stories as she re-discovered her love of history and why it matters.

Back to Faculty