April J. Mayes

April J. Mayes is Professor of History and Senior Associate Dean of the College at Pomona College, where she has been a faculty member since 2006. She holds the Warren Day Professorship and teaches in the Department of History, with expertise in Caribbean and Latin American history, gender studies, and Africana studies.

• Ph.D., University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
• B.A., Pomona College

Her research focuses on Dominican national identity, race, gender, and transnational movements in the Caribbean. She explores the transformation of Dominican identity from brown to white between 1870 and 1930 and the transnational circulation of ideas among African-descended leaders in the U.S., Haiti, and the Dominican Republic. Her work bridges intellectual and social history, with strong engagement in feminist theory and post-emancipation studies.

The trends in her publications reflect deep engagement with race, gender, and nation-building in the Dominican Republic. Her articles span topics such as Dominican feminism’s political shift, state regulation of sexuality, and transnational intellectual networks. Collectively, her scholarship challenges monocausal narratives of Dominican identity, emphasizing the interplay of race, class, gender, and imperialism.

Her scientific awards include:

• Fulbright Scholars Program, Lecture/Research Grant (2009–2010)
• Rockefeller Foundation Humanities Fellowship
• Mellon Dean's Fellowship
• Thomas J. Watson Fellowship

Mayes has been active in academic leadership, serving as co-chair of the Haiti-Dominican Republic section of the Latin American Studies Association and co-founding the Transnational Hispaniola collective. She has raised over $30,000 from the U.S. Embassy to support scholarly initiatives, including the Transnational Hispaniola Conference and the 'Intercambiando Historias' symposium. She has also reviewed for numerous journals and university presses, contributing significantly to the peer review infrastructure in Latin American and gender history.

She is currently collaborating on a two-volume archival collection on Dominican feminism and working on a textbook titled Women, Feminism, and Politics in Latin America. She leads and participates in intellectual collectives focused on advancing research in Haitian and Dominican studies.