Author, Educator, Speaker
Insurance Research Lab
Making risk and insurance visible as everyday infrastructure
The Insurance Research Lab examines how systems of risk and insurance structure everyday life and inequality. Through collaborative undergraduate research and public-facing work, the lab renders these infrastructures visible and accessible beyond the university.
"California's Invisible Infrastructure: What Auto Insurance Tells Us About Race, Risk, and Responsibility"
by Genevieve Carpio, The Metropole: The Official Blog of the Urban History Association
The road has long been tumultuous for Latinos in places like California, as a site where the private space of the automobile and the public space of the street meet. And Californians have long understood the dangers of this interface, leading to visual commentary by artists like Carlos Almaraz, street interventions by organizations like CicLAvia which draw inspiration from Latin America to re-envision roads without cars, and political reform around access to drivers’ licenses for undocumented drivers.[2] But beneath the road lies an invisible infrastructure that demands greater attention: insurance.
As business and economic historians would argue, insurance, a multi-trillion-dollar global industry, shapes our lives in profound ways. Even where the intricacies of these systems may escape many of us, the anxieties they produce are a daily reality for vulnerable populations. As urban historians prepare to gather a the UHA conference in Los Angeles for the first time, I want to interject a distinctly urbanist lens to that conversation, one pointed at the automobile. And I want to show that a focus on California cities demands our eyes have a periscopic vision...
Image: View of south side of Sixth Street Bridge overcrossing of Highway 101. Looking west-northwest. – Sixth Street Bridge, Spanning 101 Freeway at Sixth Street, Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, CA, Brian Grogan, photographer, 2001, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.
Bringing the Humanities to the Study of Risk
"Making Risk Visible: Public Humanities and the Study of Insurance"
Caitlin Diamond Patterson, Lab Manager
The Insurance Research Lab uses the tools of public humanities to spotlight the inequalities replicated and created by insurance policy and other transportation issues. Through our lab, we produce transportation equity research and package it in humanities-focused public-facing work that makes infrastructures of inequality visible and accessible. As "California's Invisible Infrastructure" (above), student zines (below), and the insurance research lab’s work prove, legacies of cases like Escobedo v. Department of Motor Vehicles are alive in Southern California. The horrifying ICE activity in recent months in California and beyond only further highlights the extent to which insurance is wielded by the state as a tool of discrimination.
The students’ use of multimedia and creative tools to present their high-quality primary research exemplifies the Insurance Lab’s vision and public humanities perspective. The zines below were refined in the lab from projects originally made in “CCAS 191: Redlining,” an undergraduate research seminar taught by Professor Genevieve Carpio at UCLA that highlights the wide sweeping and deeply embedded impacts of historical redlining policy across Southern California society. The students were trained in original research skills, ethnic studies frameworks, and the art of zine making, amongst other skills. Highlighting the lab's mission, they use visual formats and original archival research to contextualize and speak to the lingering legacies of urban renewal and insurance redlining in California.
Meet The Team
A collaborative undergraduate research team studying risk, insurance, and inequality through humanities-based research and public-facing work.
Founding members of the Insurance Research Lab, UCLA. Dr. Genevieve Carpio, Caitlin Diamond Patterson, Geidy Nuñez, Fernando Cedillo-Hernandez
Dr. Genevieve Carpio, Lab Director.
Caitlin Diamond Patterson, Lab Manager: I am a current graduate student, earning my Masters in Urban Planning (MURP) from UCLA this spring. Within planning, I am passionate about studying the impacts that megaevents, like World Cups and Olympics, can have on their host cities and the most vulnerable populations within them. Drawing from this research, I am passionate about identifying and addressing the insidious ways in which discrimination can camouflage itself within existing systems, with one major example being car insurance in Southern California. As a qualitative thinker with a liberal arts background, I am passionate about our lab’s mission and use of a multimedia qualitative approach to make risk and insurance tangible and alive.
Fernando Uriel Cedillo-Hernandez, Student Researcher: I am a first generation Mexican American student at UCLA double majoring in Biology and Political Science, and a minor in biomedical research, with interests in medicine, public service, and advocacy. Growing up in Los Angeles shaped my passion for community centered work and understanding how systems impact people’s everyday lives. Outside of academics, I am deeply passionate about art and often create projects inspired by the architecture, culture, and neighborhoods of LA. Whether through leadership, research, or creative expression, I value connection, curiosity, and finding meaningful ways to give back to the communities that shaped me.
Geidy Nuñez, Student Researcher: I am a current undergraduate student at UCLA. I am a first-gen, low-income, LA native majoring in Chicano/a and Central American Studies, Education & Social Transformation, and English. Each of my majors aims to support the principle that learning is a tool to transform societies, learning is communal and contextual, and that learning must be shared and transformed with respect and care.
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