Teaching & Mentorship

The importance of diversity and inclusion is about identity, voice, and equitable access. My teaching empowers students to critically interpret and see themselves in local, regional, national, transnational, and global histories. How we understand the past fundamentally shapes how we view the present and imagine the future – the possibilities that we can imagine for ourselves, our communities, and our world.

In my classes, I empower students to see themselves in history by exposing them to diverse course content, and by practicing the skills that scholars use to understand, analyze, and write historical narrative. When teaching U.S. and World histories, migration studies provides a powerful entry point to engage multiple scales of analysis (regional, national, transnational, and global), incorporate diverse perspectives, and draw students into the course material. Students leave my class with the ability to critically assess the different social, cultural, and political processes that define who we constitute as “native” and “newcomer,” what counts as a “national” experience, and how these understandings inform individuals’ relationships to government policies. I combine perspectives from migrants’ memoirs, letters, and documentaries with scholarly literature to promote students’ personal interest and critical understanding. Consequently, students connect with history from “the bottom up” in an empowering fashion, historically contextualize these connections, and communicate their learning more effectively to others. Students value this approach. As one student remarked: “I see my history as an American citizen and a first-generation Ugandan-American deeply reflected in this class [even] while African American history wasn’t the explicit focus of this course.”

My commitment to University education and mentorship extends to the unique learning-connection that the teacher can facilitate between the student and course material. In the many years since I first took the Asian American studies seminar that changed my worldview, I have continued to witness how representation, and a faculty invested in diversity, inclusion, and equity has profound impacts on students’ personal growth, mental health, academic and life success. At the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, I coordinated graduate students to advise advanced student majors in their senior paper projects. I also organized graduate student-faculty workshops, including “Resources, Opportunities, Outlook for Diversity in Inter-disciplinary/department Research, Recruitment, and Support.” As a post-doc affiliated with the Immigration History Research Center (IHRC) and Subjects, Objects, Agents: Young People’s Lives and Livelihoods in the Global South (YaSOA) research circle, I have intentionally advocated for the inclusion of cis female, women of color, indigenous, and non-binary scholars and community members, in all professional opportunities. As a teacher and academic, I am thus equally committed to rigorous scholarship, pedagogical development, and supporting a climate where all students and community members—regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, gender, age, language, sexuality, socioeconomic status, or ability—feel that they have equitable access to success and personal fulfillment, in whatever form that may be.

COURSES TAUGHT

University of Minnesota

  • Global Childhoods: History, Politics, and Contemporary Discourses (Graduate Seminar: DSSC 8310), Interdisciplinary Study of Global Change (ICGC), Visiting Instructor and Affiliate Scholar, Spring 2022
  • Global America: 1865-Present (HIST 1302W), Department of History, Instructor, Summer 2012; Teaching Assistant, Spring 2009
  • Population in an Interacting World (GEOG 3381W), Department of Geography, Guest Lecturer, Spring 2012  
  • Authority and Rebellion: American History to 1865 (HIST 1307), Department of History, Teaching Assistant, Fall 2008
  • Modern Japan: Meiji to the Present (1868-2000) (HIST/ALL 3471), Department of History and Asian Languages & Literatures, Reader Grader, Fall 2008
  • Introduction to East Asia: 1500-Present (HIST/EAS 3462), Department of History and East Asian Studies, Teaching Assistant, Spring 2008, Nominated for Paul Murphy Teaching Award

Stony Brook University

  • Britain since 1945: Postcolonial Disruptions (HIS 230), Department of History, Teaching Assistant, Fall 2006
  • U.S. History since 1919 (HIS 104), Department of History, Teaching Assistant, Spring 2005
  • European Colonialism and Imperialism (HIS 101), Department of History, Teaching Assistant, Fall 2005

Tufts University

  • Asian Americans in the Media, Experimental College, Student Teacher and Academic Advisor, Fall 2003-Spring 2004

Teaching Interests

  • Adoption Studies
  • American Studies
  • Asian American Studies
  • Childhood and Youth Studies
  • Immigration and Refugee History
  • North American Studies
  • Race and Ethnicity
  • Transnational and Global Migration Studies
  • Transnational United States History
  • U.S. and the World

I am also happy to share my complete Teaching Portfolio with a full Statement of Teaching Philosophy and Contributions to Diversity, Teaching and Mentorship Experience, Evidence of Teaching Excellence, and Sample Syllabi. Please contact me at cond0092 [at] umn [dot] edu.