At the University of California, Los Angeles, Dr. Benitez received B.A. degrees in Political Science and in History. He also went on to receive his M.A. and Ph.D. from UCLA in Latin American History. Dr. Juan Manuel Benitez has taught in the Chicano and Latino Studies Department at California State University, Long Beach since xxxx. Before teaching at CSULB, he worked at several other universities; including UCLA and California State University, Dominguez Hills. His areas of expertise are: immigration, the U.S.-Mexico border, globalization, and U.S.-Latin America affairs. He has taught courses on a range of subjects, such as, Latin American social history, the Mexican Revolution, Chicano history, U.S. immigration, the U.S.-Mexico border, the Latino population in the U.S., and the ethnic experience in the U.S.

 His father is originally from Guadalajara, Jalisco and his mother was born and raised in Tijuana. He grew up on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border in the surrounding areas of Tijuana, Baja California and San Diego, California. His parents migrated from Mexico in the 1970s. This background aroused his intense interest in Chicano Latino Studies subjects, which has won him notable recognition and publication.

• In addition to teaching, he currently serves as advisor to La Raza Student Association.
• He also serves as editor of the PROFMEX worldwide consortium on Mexico.
• He is co-founder and president of a non-profit community development organization, ICON (Initiating Change in Our Neighborhoods), targeting Latino communities in Los Angeles.
• He has been invited to lecture throughout the United States and Mexico at international conferences on: international law, U.S.-Mexico relations, globalization, and Mexican economic and political conditions.
• He has written extensively on issues of immigration, Latinos in the U.S., globalization, U.S.-Latin America relations, and the U.S.-Mexico border.

 His most recent research is on tourism, demographic shifts, and economic integration along the border over the last 50 years. He is currently working on two manuscripts forthcoming, major publications: Tijuana-Border City (based on his Ph.D. dissertation) and co-editing, The Statistical Abstract on the U.S.-Mexico Border.

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