USC.edu
Van Hunnick History Department

Alexia Orengo Green

Ph.D. Student
Alexia Orengo Green
Pronouns She / Her / Hers Email orengogr@usc.edu

Biography

Alexia M. Orengo Green is a PhD candidate at the Van Hunnick History Department at the University of Southern California where she also received a Graduate Certificate on Jewish Studies and an MA in History. She holds a MA in Archives & Public History from New York University and a BA in History and Archaeology from Dickinson College. In addition to her academic work, Orengo Green conducts interviews for USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive (VHA) and has participated in multiple oral history works including the NEH-supported project “Memory & History: Transforming the Narrative of the Spanish Civil War & Francoist Dictatorship.”

 

 

Orengo Green has been awarded multiple fellowships and research grants such as the Beth and Arthur Lev Student Research Fellowship from USC’s Center for Advanced Genocide Research (CAGR), the Fritz Thyssen Pre-Dissertation Fellowship from the German Historical Institute, the Auschwitz Jewish Center Fellowship, the Shoah Foundation’s Steve and Sandy Cozen Graduate Fellowship, and the Dr. Gabriele Meyer Fellowship from the Institut für die Geschichte der deutschen Juden in Hamburg. During fall 2024 Orengo Green was the Junior Fellow at the Center for Holocaust Studies from the Leibniz Institute for Contemporary History in Munich, Germany. Most recently, she received the coveted Claims Conference Saul Kagan Fellowship and the Leo Baeck Fellowship.

 

Orengo Green’s dissertation, “Mediators of Migrations,” examines the experiences of Jewish children who escaped Nazi Germany and went to Latin America during the Holocaust. Through this focus Orengo Green demonstrates that during migration, Jewish children had agency as they became a key part of the migration process while also being interlocutors of culture, racial perceptions, and language to their families and the German Jewish refugee community.

Education

  • MA New York University, 5/2021
  • BA Dickinson College, 5/2019

  • Summary Statement of Research Interests

    My research focuses on the German Jewish children who escaped Nazi Germany and went to Latin America during the Holocaust. I investigate the agency of the children and teenagers during their migration and time in their countries of refuge.

    Research Keywords

    Holocaust, Second World War, Children, Race, Emotions, Identity, Migration, Latin America, Digital Humanities.

    Research Specialties

    Holocaust, Second World War, Children, Race, Emotions, Memory, Trauma, Identity, Migration, Latin America, Public History.

  • Conference Presentations

    • “Pineapples for Passover: Jewish Migration to Puerto Rico during the Holocaust.” Lessons & Legacies Emerging Scholars Conference 2025 , 11/2025
    • “The Construction of an Interview: Jewish Child Refugees in Latin America.” Narrating the Past: Testimonies Between Personal Memory and Historical Research, Selbstzeugnisse revisited e.V , 6/2025
    • “Pineapples for Passover: Jewish Migration to Puerto Rico during the Holocaust.” West Coast Germanists’ Workshop: Migration, Mobility, and Exchange , 3/2025
    • “Matzah & Bananas: Jewish Migration to Puerto Rico during the Holocaust.” Seminar Four: “The Holocaust: Global, Imperial, and Postcolonial Approaches.” Lessons & Legacies , 11/2024
    • Thyssen Pre-Dissertation Fellowships Roundtable. German Historical Institute (GHI) West Germanist Workshop & Network, , 2/2024
    • GSA Emerging Scholars Workshop , 10/2023
    • “Whose Records? Asylum, Archives, and the Administrative State.” Culture Mapping 2022: Archives & Afterlives , 4/2022
    • “Supra-Institutional Collaborations in Times of COVID: An Extensible Model for Digital Project Development” Association for Computers and the Humanities , 7/2021
    • “A New Look at Teaching the Holocaust: A Teacher’s Guide to Expanding the Holocaust Narrative Beyond Anne Frank” Nexus: A Cross-Disciplinary Master’s Research Conference , 5/2021
    • “Memory & History: Transforming the Narrative of the Spanish Civil War & Francoist Dictatorship” University of California San Diego Spanish History Symposium , 1/2021
    • “Life at Camp Michaux: A View from the Artifacts” Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting , 4/2019
    • 09100 Die letzen Zeugen. Der Holocaust in mündlich: Video History Archive Interview Process & Experiences Dr. Tobias Wals, Ludwig-Maximilians- Universität München, Germany, Fall 2024
    • HIST 109 “The Latin American Experience”: Latin America During the Second World War Dr. Joan Flores-Villalobos, University of Southern California, United States, Spring 2024
    • HIST 376 “The Holocaust”: Complicating Bystanders Through Schindler Dr. Karl Qualls, Dickinson College, Pennsylvania, United States, Spring 2023
    • JS 211 “The Holocaust” : Persecution of Roma & Sinti During the Holocaust Dr. Wolf Gruner, University of Southern California, United States, Spring 2023
    • JS 211 “The Holocaust” : Sexual Violence Against Women & Children During the Holocaust Dr. Wolf Gruner, University of Southern California, United States, Spring 2023

  • Journal Article

    • (2021). Life at Camp Michaux: A View from the Artifacts. Pennsylvania Archaeologist. Vol. 91 (1), pp. 1-14.
    • (2021). A Journey into the A-Files: A Digital Public History Project is Born. Esferas. Vol. 12 (Fall 2021), pp. 120-121.

    Other

    • (2020). Online Supplement to Stalin’s Niños: Educating Spanish Civil War Refugee Children in the Soviet Union, 1937-1951. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2020. Dickinson Scholar.
    • 2025-26 Saul Kagan Fellowship in Advanced Shoah Studies, 05/2025 –
    • USC Shoah Foundation’s Steve and Sandy Cozen Graduate Fellowship, 03/2025 –
    • 2025-2026 Leo Baeck Fellowship Program (declined), Fall 2025
    • Dr. Gabriele Meyer Fellowship , Spring 2025
    • General Education Graduate Assistant Award , Spring 2025
    • Teresa Wilson Fellowship, Spring 2025
    • Terry Seip Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award, Fall 2024
    • Beth and Arthur Lev Student Research Fellows for Summer 2024, 07/2024 – 08/2024
    • Graduate Certificate in Jewish Studies Funding, 06/2024 – 07/2024
    • 2024 Junior Fellow at the Center for Holocaust Studies, (Joint Fellowship with the USHMM), Spring 2024
    • Gold Family Graduate Fellowship, Spring 2024
    • Graduate School Travel/Research Award, Spring 2024
    • Max & Hilde Kochman Summer School- University of Sussex, 07/2023
    • Holocaust Educational Foundation Summer Institute Fellowship, 06/2023 – 07/2023
    • Harold Hastings McVicar Scholarship, Spring 2023
    • Hovel Summer Travel Grant, Spring 2023
    • The Roberta Persinger Foulke Endowment Fellowship, Spring 2023
    • Auschwitz Jewish Center Fellows- Auschwitz Jewish Center, 06/2022 – 07/2022
    • Fritz Thyssen Pre-Dissertation Fellowship- German Historical Institute, Spring 2022
    • Hovel Summer Travel Grant, Spring 2022
    • The Roberta Persinger Foulke Endowment Fellowship, Spring 2022
    • GSAS Pathways to the Ph.D. Program, 08/2019 – 05/2021
    • GSAS Student Fees Awards, 08/2019 – 05/2021
    • GSAS Tuition Scholarship, 08/2019 – 05/2021
    • The Mary M. Moser memorial Book Award, Spring 2019
    • The Morris W. Prince History Prize in Support of Graduate Study, Spring 2019
    • Eta Sigma Phi Classics Honor Society, Spring 2016

  • Professional Memberships

    • Association for Jewish Studies, 2025 –
    • Immigration & Ethnic History Society, 2025 –
    • International Association of Genocide Scholars, 2025 –
    • Society for the History of Children and Youth, 2025 –
    • German Studies Association, 2023 –
    • American Historical Association, 2020 –
    • Archaeological Institute of America, 2019 –