The Chosen Exile of Racial Passing

Allyson Hobbs is an assistant professor of American history. Her research interests include American cultural history, identity formation, mobility, and migration. Professor Hobbs teaches courses on African American history, African American women's history, and twentieth century American history. Her teaching has garnered awards including the Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize, the Graves Award in the Humanities, and the St. Clair Drake Outstanding Teaching Award from the Program in African and African American Studies. She is a Distinguished Lecturer for the Organization of American Historians and a contributor to the New Yorker.com. Professor Hobbs’s debut book, A Chosen Exile: A History of Racial Passing in American Life, explores the phenomenon of racial passing in the United States. A Chosen Exile won the Frederick Jackson Turner Prize for best first book in American history and the Lawrence Levine Prize for best book in American cultural history.

Perry’s on the Embarcadero is located in the Hotel Griffon, at 155 Steuart Street, between Mission and Howard Streets. It is also accessible from the Embarcadero.