Department of History

Erin Faigin

Credentials: Julie A. and Peter M. Weil Fellow

Position title: TA: History 219 with Professor Michels

Email: faigin@wisc.edu

Address:
Advisors: Tony Michels, Amos Bitzan, Susan Johnson, and Cindy Cheng

Office Hours: By Appointment

Erin Faigin

Biography

My work is focused on Jewish life in the San Fernando Valley, the large suburban expanse of Northern Los Angeles where I grew up. The valley is home to half of Los Angeles’s Jews, making it one of the largest Jewish communities in the world. I am especially interested in ethnoburbs, popular culture, intellectual networks, working class Jews and politics. My dissertation explores and seeks to connect the history of Valley Girls, private schooling, pornography, freeway construction and Jewish chicken farmers in the San Fernando Valley.

Education

M.A. History, UW-Madison, 2019
B.A., History, UC Berkeley, 2016

Field

  • U.S./North American History
  • Jewish History

Working Dissertation Title

  • “Among Their Own: Jewish Suburbanization in the San Fernando Valley “

Selected Publications

Courses Taught as TA

  • History 102 – American History from the Civil War to the Present
  • History 152 – History of the American West since 1850
  • History 219 – The American Jewish Experience: From Shtetl to Suburb

Courses Taught as Instructor

  • History 201 – The Historian’s Craft: The Suburb in American History
  • History 227 – Race and Place in the Upper Midwest