Charles, Missouri. His research and teaching interests sit at the intersections among African American Studies, Latin American Studies, and Mexican history. He has published articles highlighting the contributions of Mexican art and music to the New Negro Movement; the place of Mexican dance within African American visions of the Afro-Caribbean; and the racialization of "La bamba" in Mexican culture, the African Diaspora, and Chicano nationalism. He is the only Latin American historian to receive a two-year residential fellowship from the Carter G. Woodson Institute for African-American and African Studies at the University of Virginia. His research has also received external funding and awards from the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, the Conference on Latin American History, the University of Pittsburgh, and the Middle Atlantic Conference on Latin American Studies.