Angela Ju, associate professor of International Affairs and Political Science at St. Edwards’s University, published “Identities Matter: Politics of Immigration and Incorporation,” in March, a book that bridges her academic expertise with deeply personal roots.
For years, Ju kept a significant part of her story private. It wasn’t until last year that she began sharing with students that her parents were undocumented for part of her childhood.
“It was really the students who were able to articulate to me why that was important to hear,” Ju said. “In order to validate my students’ experience, it’s important for them to know that they have professors who have had similar life experiences.”
The book stems from seven months of fieldwork in Brazil, conducted as part of a language study research grant. Ju focused on immigration patterns to a country that has historically served as an alternative destination for migrants rejected by the United States.
“I realized that at that time, there really wasn’t that much research on immigration, even though Brazil historically had been one of the major recipient countries of immigration within the Western Hemisphere,” Ju said. “It’s been one of the places that immigrants who wanted to go to the U.S., but were rejected, (end up). You know, many of them did end up going to countries like Brazil.”
Having received three bachelor’s degrees in Latin American Studies, European Studies and Spanish, and a doctoral degree in Political Science, Ju values the varying angles her education and experience allow her to approach topics. She argues that immigration studies require perspectives beyond traditional political science.
“In my book, I write equally about social assimilation from sociology as I do about colloquial corporations from political science,” Ju said. “Those are actually two highly interrelated processes and so it doesn’t make sense to talk about them separately as if they don’t intersect with each other at all in the real world.”
Before coming to St. Edward’s in 2019, Ju worked as an international development consultant and assistant professor in Washington, D.C. and New York City. She returned to teaching in 2017 and was promoted to associate professor this past August.
For Ju, her students are a driving force that motivates her active engagement in immigration and political science research.
“I think it’s actually from so many students who are also from immigrant backgrounds and getting them to realize that their experiences are valid,” she said.
Ju, who now teaches courses in global public health, migration and political science, feels welcome on campus and in the university’s environment in general.
“This is the most gorgeous campus I’ve ever been on,” Ju said. “All the faculty who interviewed me seemed very collegial, the students I met with seemed excited about the courses I proposed teaching.”
The book is available through digital platforms and in hardcover.
