My name is Jennifer A. Cárcamo (she/hers), PhD, and I am a first-generation scholar and filmmaker. Born and raised in Los Angeles to migrants who fled El Salvador during the 1980s civil war, I am a historian specializing in the social movement history of Central America, including its Diaspora. I hope to teach Central American history, as well as continue conducting community-based research and producing historical documentaries that uplift the stories of Central American peoples across race, class, gender, and sexuality.

Currently, I am a UC President’s and Andrew Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California, Irvine in the Department of Chicano/Latino Studies where I am working on my book Historias Prohibidas del Istmo: Central American Communists during the Rise of Twentieth Century Fascism, 1920-1940. My book focuses on the origins and evolution of the first communist parties in Central America. I am particularly interested in the ways these parties and movements frontally opposed fascism through transnational organizing efforts that centered international solidarity as well as involved women and Afroindigenous communities. In the process of developing my book, I have conducted archival research in Cuba, Mexico, Russia, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Costa Rica, with the generous support of various academic institutions. Thus far, my research has been published in the Latin American Law Review, Anuario de Estudios Centroamericanos, Feminist Formations, and Race and Class (see “Publications“).

My first documentary, Children of the Diaspora: For Peace and Democracy (2013), is based on student testimonies of Diasporic Salvadoran youth traveling to El Salvador in 2009, and can be viewed for free at https://childrenofthediaspora.com/. My second documentary, Eternos Indocumentados: Central American Refugees in the United States (2018), is about forced migration from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, as well as the US practice of inhumane refugee incarceration, and can also be viewed for free at https://www.eternosindocumentados.com/. To date, my films have been publicly screened in the United States, Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Cuba.

Research Interests: Social History of Central America; Central American Revolutions; Contemporary Latin America across race, class, and gender; Radical traditions in 20th century Latin America; Communist and socialist movements; Central Americans in the U.S.; Refugees and forced migration; U.S empire, imperialism; Critical Histories of Capitalism, Neoliberalism, and Fascism; Latin American Film and Cinema

Academic Fields & Subfields: Latin American Studies, Latin American History, Latina/o/x Studies, Central American Studies, Critical Refugee Studies, Oral History