I am Eraldo Souza dos Santos, a historian and philosopher with research interests in the history of ideas, the invention of traditions, and the politics of translation. In my current project, I trace the global history of the idea of civil disobedience to shed critical light on contemporary anti-protest rhetoric. My articles have appeared or are forthcoming in the Annual Review of Law and Ethics, Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture, and Society, the South Atlantic Quarterly, and The Tocqueville Review. I am also currently writing a family memoir with my mother, Nilva Moreira de Souza, probing how she, then a seven-year-old child, was sold into slavery during Brazil’s military dictatorship in the late 1960s. We were nominated for two Pushcart Prizes in 2025, and one of our poems will appear in POETRY Magazine. “She Is There,” a piece stemming from this project, will appear in Best Small Fictions 2025. I have also been selected by Yaddo (where I held the Abigail Angell Canfield and Cass Canfield Jr. Residency), the Blue Mountain Center, the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, and the Vermont Studio Center to work on this project.

I am currently an Assistant Professor of Law and Society and History (by courtesy) at the University of California, Irvine, where I also serve as Core Faculty for the Latin American Studies Minor and Graduate Emphasis. I was previously a Klarman Fellow at Cornell University and hold a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the Sorbonne. I am currently a Book Reviews Editor for The Black Scholar.

Contact: eraldo.souzadossantos@uci.edu (I am autistic, and I suffer from often severe crises of generalized anxiety disorder. If I do not reply in 48 hours, please do not hesitate to send me a kind reminder.)

Languages: English, French, German, Portuguese, Spanish, and ภาษาไทย

Pronouns: they/them/theirs