RAFU SHIMPO (LOS ANGELES) -- After a national search, Professor Karen Umemoto has been appointed as the new director of the Asian American Studies Center at University of California, Los Angeles, and as the inaugural holder of the Helen and Morgan Chu Endowed Director’s Chair.
Umemoto received her Ph.D. in urban studies from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and holds a Master of Arts in Asian American studies from UCLA and a Bachelor of Arts in interdisciplinary social science from San Francisco State University. She had served on the faculty of the University of Hawaii at Manoa since 1996.
“We are pleased by the news that such a passionate, extraordinary, engaged scholar as Professor Umemoto will be joining the UCLA faculty and the center,” said Helen and Morgan Chu, “and excited that the Chu Endowed Director’s Chair will support and move forward the center’s outstanding research initiatives and activities in Asian American studies, ethnic studies, and the larger society.”
Photo courtesy of University of California, Los Angeles