The USC Libraries Collections Convergence Initiative (CCI) has named Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell and Elwing Suong Gonzalez as visiting scholars. Their appointments come as part of a new program—designed by historian Becky Nicolaides—that connects independent scholars with the resources of the USC Libraries, including databases, journal subscriptions, and primary sources, as well as with the wider academic community at the University of Southern California.
Their bios, provided by CCI director William Deverell, follow:
Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell is an independent scholar and a former curatorial fellow at the Huntington Library and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. She is the author of Fashion Victims: Dress at the Court of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette (Yale, 2015), Worn on This Day: The Clothes That Made History (Running Press, 2019), and The Way We Wed: A Global History of Wedding Fashion (Running Press, 2020). She has written about fashion, art, and culture for The Atlantic, The Washington Post, Politico, and The Wall Street Journal and has appeared on NPR, the Biography Channel, and Reelz. She was a 2020-21 NEH Public Scholar. She will use her time at the USC Libraries to complete her work in progress, a biography of American fashion designer Chester Weinberg, drawing upon resources including the library's collection of midcentury periodicals and the ONE Archives at USC Libraries.
Elwing Suong Gonzalez is a public school and community college educator and a historian looking at U.S. immigration and refugee history and urban history, with a focus on Los Angeles. She has published work on Vietnamese refugee settlement in Los Angeles and ethnic enclave development and is currently working on examining broader refugee settlement and community development in Los Angeles in the 1970s and 1980s. She received her MA in history from Cal State Los Angeles and her PhD in history from Claremont Graduate University. She is also an artist and mother of three lovely boys.