Imperial Zions: Pacific Histories of the West

Author Amanda Hendrix-Komoto discusses her recently released book, "Imperial Zions: Religion, Race, and Family in the American West and the Pacific," with Andrés Reséndez, author and professor of history at the University of California at Davis.

Amanda Hendrix-Komoto is an Assistant Professor of History at Montana State University. She holds a Ph.D. in history from the University of Michigan, and is the author of Imperial Zions: Religion, Race, and Family in the American West and the Pacific (University of Nebraska Press, 2022).

Andrés Reséndez is a professor of history and author who grew up in Mexico City and currently teaches at the University of California at Davis. His specialties are early European exploration and colonization of the Americas, the U.S-Mexico border region, and the early history of the Pacific Ocean. His previous book, The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016), was a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award and winner of the 2017 Bancroft Prize from Columbia University. His latest book, Conquering the Pacific (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021), is about the first expedition to go from America to Asia and back, thus transforming the Pacific Ocean into a vital space of contact and exchange