University Scholar Anna Guevarra

The University Scholars Program, sponsored by the Office of the President, honors faculty members for superior research and teaching, along with great promise for future achievements. The award provides $15,000 a year for three years to enhance their scholarly activities.

Anna Guevarra
Professor, Global Asian Studies 
UIC College of Liberal Arts and Sciences 

Years at UIC: 18

What themes or questions drive your research? 
As an interdisciplinary scholar, the issues animating my research include the state’s regulation of labor, the geopolitics of care work, migration and displacements. I’m also always searching for new ways to do public interdisciplinary work that centers just, equitable and reciprocal engagements with communities. Specifically, I am interested in exploring how racial capitalism, militarism and U.S. colonial projects impact the organization of labor globally, the development of technologies and the local and global social movements that emerge in response.

This is evident in my current projects, which include:

• Examining the impact of robotic technologies and artificial intelligence in shaping our understanding of care work, especially the gendered and racialized hierarchies that affect how technology becomes a broker of care and contributes to exacerbating racial inequities.
• Uncovering the submerged histories of multiracial resistance in neighborhoods experiencing urban and economic displacement.
• Using food and foodways as a prism to trace the transoceanic connections between the Philippines and India.

As a public scholar of critical ethnic studies and immigration, I am also interested in exploring creative interdisciplinary methodologies in service of amplifying communities’ ability to build power. 

What sparked your interest in these research areas?
I come from a family of migrant workers, beginning with my late father who was part of the early cohorts of Filipino laborers who worked in the Middle East thanks to the construction of a labor export economy by an authoritarian regime. The labor he performed and the injustices he and our family experienced sparked my interest in understanding the political economies that governed our lives. My lived experiences as a 1.5-generation Filipina immigrant growing up in multiracial and working-class neighborhoods generated questions that later drew me to critical ethnic and gender studies and informed my intellectual trajectories and commitments. 

What courses do you teach, and are there topics you particularly enjoy teaching?
I enjoy teaching courses that allow students to get to know the communities of which they are a part, and anchoring these explorations in commitments to social justice. While I teach courses that center Asian American issues, these courses intrinsically aim to build connections with other communities to emphasize interconnectedness. These include courses like Introduction to Filipino American Studies; Cultural Politics of Asian American Food; Global Asia in Chicago; Asian Markets, Corporations and Social Justice; and Asian America and Transnational Feminism.

What strategies help you balance teaching and research?
I do not see teaching and research as separate entities that need balance. Instead, my scholarly work informs my teaching, and I strive to find ways to make my research legible to my students. In turn, what I learn from my students also informs my research. 

What advice would you give to students interested in research careers?
As a scholar, you are always building on the knowledge of those who came before you, however innovative or original you perceive your work to be. So first, be diligent, careful and humble in reading the work of scholars in your field; remember that we are always standing on the shoulders of those who came before us. Second, be curious, and read broadly and widely beyond your field. Some of the best ideas come from interdisciplinary engagements. Lastly, ask yourself the “so what?” question. Why does your research matter, and to whom? What is your research in service to beyond the advancement of your career?