Vicki Ruiz papers, 1977-2021

Printable guide [HTML]

Summary

Abstract:

The Vicki Ruiz papers contain manuscripts, articles, seminars, lectures, correspondence and other writings documenting the professional life of Chicano/Chicana studies scholar and professor Vicki Ruiz. The bulk of the collection consists of notes and drafts of Ruiz's numerous publications, student papers and oral histories, and correspondence. In addition to her writings and correspondence, items such as administrative files, financial records, and other materials provide documentation of Ruiz's professional and university-related activities, including her time at such institutions as University of Texas, El Paso, Claremont Graduate University, and University of California, Irvine. The collection also contains floppy discs, DVDs and VHS tapes, and a small amount of realia.

Extent:

24.2 Linear Feet (20 records storage boxes; 1 letter-size document box; 2 legal-size document boxes; 3 multimedia boxes containing 3 CDs, 12 DVDs, 79 floppy discs, and 17 VHS tapes; 3 flat boxes) and 0.055 Gigabytes (1 digital file)

Language:

English .

Preferred citation:

Vicki Ruiz papers. MS-F053. Special Collections and Archives, The UC Irvine Libraries, Irvine, California. [Date accessed].

For the benefit of current and future researchers, please cite any additional information about sources consulted in this collection, including permanent URLs, item or folder descriptions, and box/folder locations.

Background

Scope and content:

Biographical / historical:

"Vicki L. Ruiz is Distinguished Professor Emerita of History and Chicano/Latino Studies at the University of California, Irvine. The first in her family to receive an advanced degree, she graduated from Gulf Coast Community College and Florida State and then went on earn a Ph.D. in History at Stanford in June 1982. Two months later she showed up for her first teaching position at U.T. El Paso with her oldest son on her hip and her youngest on the way. Over the course of three decades, she has helped found and shape the field of Chicana/Latina history and in 2012 became the first Latina historian inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The Academy characterized her work as follows: 'Entered the history profession when the idea of a separate field of Chicano/Latino history hardly existed. Her pioneering scholarship and leadership helped create a field that now has a place in every graduate history program. Skillfully blending insights from the history of women, of workers, and from the arena of ethnic studies, she inspired a generation of students and scholars to think seriously about how the examination of one large and complicated ethnic group can help us understand U.S. history writ large.'

An award-winning scholar and educator, she is the author of Cannery Women, Cannery Lives and From Out of the Shadows: Mexican Women in Twentieth- Century America and co-author of Created Equal: A History of the United States. She has edited or co-edited ten anthologies, including the influential Unequal Sisters with Ellen DuBois. She and Virginia Sánchez Korrol co-edited the three-volume Latinas in the United States: A Historical Encyclopedia, which received a 2007 "Best in Reference" Award from the New York Public Library. Over the course of her career, Ruiz has participated in numerous public history and community engagement programs, including UCI's "Humanities Out There," "Arizona State's Hispanic-Mother Daughter Program," and UC Davis's "Mentorships for Undergraduate Researchers in Agriculture, Letters, and Sciences". From 2007-2012, she served as Dean of the School of Humanities at UC Irvine. Directing twenty-seven dissertations, she has mentored four generations of graduate students from UC Davis, Claremont Graduate School, Arizona State, and UC Irvine. Her students teach at a variety of institutions, including Dartmouth, Brown, Nebraska, University of Illinois, Chicago, and five California State University campuses.

The National Women's History Alliance named her a 2015 Honoree in recognition of her scholarship. Ruiz has also received a lifetime achievement award from the Immigration and Ethnic History Association and the OAH Rosenzweig Award for distinguished service. Other honors include the Vicki L Ruiz Award for best article on race in the North American West given by the Western History Association. She is past president of the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians, Organization of American Historians, and the American Historical Association. On September 10, 2015, she received the National Humanities Medal from President Barack Obama and on May 26, 2022, an honorary Doctor of Laws from Harvard University.

For further details, see Chicana/o Oral History Project , Digital archive, Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. Interviewed by Todd Holmes."

-- Vicki L. Ruiz

Acquisition information:

Gift of Vicki Ruiz, 2021.

Processing information:

Donor's original order and file folder naming have been maintained.

Arrangement:

Materials are loosely organized chronologically and grouped according to Ruiz's career: undergrad and graduate school notes 1977-1982, her first job at UT El Paso 1982-1985, Claremont through 1995, correspondence 1982-1991, 19th century archival materials from CA, TX, NM, CO, and AZ, her UC Davis Chicano Studies MURALS program (Mentorships for Undergraduate Researchers in Agriculture Letters + Science early pipeline program, she was inaugural director 1985-1992), UC Davis history correspondence 1985-1992, miscellaneous files, teaching evaluations, syllabi, grad materials, dissertations, oral histories (mostly student interviews from 1981), professional associations, primary materials, UCI Humanities Out There (HOT) 2001-2003, and her time as Dean of the School of Humanities 2007-2012, Arizona State 1995-2001, UCI 2001-2017 including merit files, service, teaching, the Gilder Lehrman Institute, press articles, research materials on TX labor history, kudos 1985-2019, public history articles projects 1980-2020, model grad student essays, dissertations and MA theses by students, LA history, research, drafts and reviews.

Rules or conventions:

Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Indexed terms

Subjects:: Universities and colleges -- United States -- Faculty
Mexican Americans -- Study and teaching (Higher) -- California -- Irvine
University and college faculty members

Access and use

Restrictions:: The collection is open for research. Access to original audio tapes, video recordings, and floppy discs is restricted; contact the Department of Special Collections and Archives at spcoll@uci.edu for more information. Please contact the Department of Special Collections and Archives in advance to request digital materials access.
Terms of access:: Property rights reside with the University of California. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. For permission to reproduce or to publish, please contact the University Archivist.