Department of History Welcomes Two New Full-Time Faculty
The Department of History is exceptionally pleased to welcome two new full-time faculty members this year; Dr. Michael Karp, who will be based at the Palm Desert Campus, and Dr. Daisy Ocampo, who will be contributing to our Public History program here the San Bernardino campus. Welcome! We look forward to working with you both.
After double-majoring in history and religious studies at Humboldt State University, Dr Karp earned his MA and PhD in history at Saint Louis University. He studies the social and environmental history of the American West. Hist current book project, Landscapes of Labor Strife: California, Capitalism, and the Pacific World, examines how the spread of global capitalism violently reordered labor patterns and social relations in northwestern California.
Since earning his PhD, he has had the unique privilege to teach in a variety of settings including an independent middle school, public high schools, dual enrollment programs, and community colleges and universities. As an educator and resident of the Coachella Valley, he will be joining CSUSB’s Palm Desert Campus and the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences.
Daisy Ocampo (Caz’ Ahmo Indigenous Nation of Zacatecas, Mexico) earned her PhD in History from the University of California, Riverside in 2019. Her research in Native and Public History informs her work with museum exhibits, historical preservation projects, and community-based archives. Her research integrates critical race theory, decolonial praxis of tribal sovereignty, and community traditions to create a new direction of inclusivity in Public History that visibilizes Indigenous people, voices and community narratives.
The U.S. Department of Education awarded the Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need (GAANN) Fellowship to fund her work to include critical Indigenous scholarship to the field of Public History.
She joins the History Department at CSUSB to share its commitment to transforming student’s lives through education. She brings her own experience as a first- generation college student which has enriched her approaches to research, student engagement and teaching pedagogy. Secondly, Dr. Ocampo is particularly interested in connecting local tribal communities, organizations and cultural institutions to CSU San Bernardino. She looks forward to working with students on Public History service-learning projects that reflect the local and regional landscape of the Inland Empire and Coachella Valley.