Kevin Escudero (PhD, UC Berkeley; MSL, Yale Law School) is an Assistant Professor of American Studies and Ethnic Studies and affiliated faculty member in the Department of Sociology, Population Studies and Training Center, and Native American and Indigenous Studies at Brown University. Professor Escudero's research and teaching interests include comparative studies of race, ethnicity, and Indigeneity; U.S. empire and settler colonialism; immigration and citizenship; social movements; and law. His book, Organizing While Undocumented (New York University Press, 2020) examines undocumented Asian, Latinx, queer, and formerly undocumented activists' strategic use of an intersectional movement identity. The book draws on more than five years of ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth interviews with immigrant rights activists in San Francisco, Chicago, and New York City. It received Honorable Mention for the American Sociological Association Section on Asia and Asian America's 2021 Asian American Book Award and was a Finalist for the Society for the Study of Social Problems' 2020 C. Wright Mills Award.
He is currently at work on two research projects. The first is a book manuscript on immigrant and Indigenous activists' participation in Guam's decolonization movement. The project grows out of a broader interest in the relationship between immigrant political activism and Indigenous movements for self-determination, particularly in the context of U.S. empire, military expansion, and settler colonialism. The second, "'Education, Not Deportation': Immigrant Graduate and Professional Degree Students' Experiences across Legal Status," focuses on immigrant students' experiences along the educational pipeline and into the U.S. workforce, paying particular attention to the role of legal status. Funded by an NSF CAREER Award, this project also includes the development of the Immigrant Student Research Project (ISRP) Lab to train students in the use of mixed methods research approaches with an emphasis on public facing, community engaged research practices.
As a Public Voices Fellow at the OpEd Project Professor Escudero has published pieces in Latino USA, The Hechinger Report, and Truthout applying his academic research to pressing issues facing immigrant community members today. From 2016-2017, he served as Special Advisor to the Provost for Undocumented and DACA Students offering campus-wide workshops and trainings regarding approaches to supporting undocumented students. His research has been supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, American Council of Learned Societies, American Sociological Association, AccessLex Institute, Institute for Citizens and Scholars, National Science Foundation, UC-MEXUS Institute, and UC Berkeley Center for the Study of Law and Society.
