New Directors for Honors, African American Studies

The College of Liberal Arts is proud to announce the return of two faculty members to leadership posts at the college. Both members have previously led their respective new assignments. We welcome and thank them for taking on these leadership tasks in service of our students.

The College of Liberal Arts welcomes Dr. Michael Topp in his new capacity as the Director for the Liberal Arts Honors Program. Previously, Dr. Topp served as the founding Director of the Honors Program. He has also been Chair of the Department of History and has served as Associate Dean of the College of Liberal Arts.

His research focuses on racial and ethnic history, working-class history, and the history of social movements in the United States. He is the author of Those Without a Country: The Political Culture of Italian American Syndicalists (2001), and The Sacco and Vanzetti Case: A Brief History (2004), as well as numerous essays on the Italian American Left, immigrant historiography and its relevance to the border, and racial and ethnic identity in the United States. His current project, “The Long Reach of the Holocaust,” focuses on Jewish migration, community formation and apostasy through the lens of his own family.

Dr. Topp can be reached at mtopp@utep.edu

The College of Liberal Arts is also pleased to announce Dr. Selfa Chew as the Director for the African American Studies Program. Dr. Chew holds the position of Associate Dean for the Undergraduate Students.

Her research explores Asian and African diasporas in the Americas. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing and two doctorate degrees: a Ph.D. in Borderlands History and a Ph.D. in Teaching, Learning and Culture, all from UTEP. Among her publications are Mudas las garzas (2007), Diamantina Molotov (2022), Day of the Dead (2020), and Uprooting Community: Japanese Mexicans, World War II and the US-Mexico Borderlands (2015). This latest title won the International Latino Book Award in 2016 and the Southwest Book Award in 2017.

Dr. Chew previously led the African American Studies Program in 2016-17.

Dr. Chew can be reached at sachewmithart@utep.edu