Research Interests

Sarah McNamara is Assistant Professor of History and core faculty in the Latina/o/x & Mexican American Studies Program at Texas A&M University. McNamara’s research centers on Latinx, women and gender, immigration, and labor histories in the modern United States.

Her first book, Ybor City: Crucible of the Latina South, examines the U.S. South as a transnational, multi-racial borderland and argues that in this space gender and sexuality played a central role in the (re)making of race, community, region, and nation. Ybor City is the history of three generations of migrant, immigrant, and U.S. born Latinas and Latinos— predominantly from Cuba, the Caribbean, and the Americas—who collided in Tampa, Florida from the late nineteenth through the mid twentieth centuries. While popular narratives of the origins of Latina/o/x Florida focus on Cuban immigrants who fled the rise of Fidel Castro in the 1950s and 1960s, McNamara centers on earlier generations whose migration, labor, activism, and leftist politics established the foundation of latinidad in the sunshine state. This portrait of political shifts that defined Ybor City highlights the underexplored role of women’s leadership within movements for social and economic justice as it illustrates how people, places, and politics become who and what they are.

Dr. McNamara’s work has received support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Association for University Women, the American Historical Association, and the Tulane Center for the Gulf South, among others. In recognition of her commitment to research, service, and teaching she was named a Mellon Emerging Faculty Leader by the Institute for Citizens and Scholars as well as a Montague-Center for Teaching Excellence Scholar at Texas A&M University. Sarah McNamara in academic outlets such as Labor: Studies in Working Class History, Journal of Immigration and Ethnic History, and South Writ Large and public outlets such as the Washington Post, the Houston Chronicle, and Public Seminar.

Beyond her historical writing, McNamara is dedicated to uniting her writing with public history and popular discourse. At present, she is at work on an historic marker and mural project that unites the City of Tampa with artists from Ybor City to foster dynamic conversations about Latina/o/x history and historical memory in Florida. The first marker, which centers of the Antifascist Women’s March of 1937, will unveil in March 2023. Dr. Sarah McNamara is a native of Tampa, Florida and her family is from Ybor City.

Publications

Examines the U.S. South as a transnational, multi-racial borderland and argues that in this space gender and sexuality played a central role in the (re)making of race, community, region, and nation.

Accomplishments

National & External
Monroe Research Fellowship, Tulane Center for the Gulf South, 2021
Faculty Fellowship, American Association of University Women, 2020-2021
Research Stipend Award, American Association of University Women, 2020-2021
Mellon Emerging Faculty Leaders Fellowship, Institute for Citizens and Scholars, 2020-2021

Internal
Carlos H. Cantu Research Grant, Texas A&M University, 2022-2023
Faculty Fellowship Program, Glasscock Center for the Humanities, Texas A&M University, 2022-2023
Montague Award for Teaching Excellence, College of Liberal Arts, Texas A&M University, 2021-2022
Summer Research Fellowship, College of Liberal Arts, Texas A&M University, 2022
Summer Research Fellowship, Glasscock Center for the Humanities, Texas A&M University, 2021
Carlos H. Cantu Endowment Research Grant, Texas A&M University, 2019-2020
College of Liberal Arts, S.E.E.D. Grant, Texas A&M University, 2019-2020