Staff and Board

Mark Wallem has served as Executive Director since 2019. Prior to his time with ALBA, he worked in international development for 21 years, including posts in Nepal, Cambodia, the Philippines, Ukraine, and Thailand. His international projects include a groundbreaking Internet Freedom program, promoting and defending online freedom of expression in Southeast Asia. He has also directed programs for the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) and UN Women. Hailing from Minnesota, Wallem is a lawyer, with a history of political activism and rights advocacy in both the US and abroad.

Marina Mihajlova moved to NYC from Macedonia (Southeast Europe) in 2011, along with her family. She has been in the accounting and bookkeeping sector since she was young, and was brought up working with her family’s business in her home country. Coming to the US was a big challenge, and the accounting practices differ somewhat, but in the end, the numbers are still what matter. Like ALBA, she is dedicated to social activism and the defense of human rights. Marina is also a supporter of Greenpeace, environmental justice, and animal welfare.

Aaron Retish is Professor of History at Wayne State University in Detroit where he chairs the Veterans of the Spanish Civil War Scholarship.  He is the author and editor of several books on the early Soviet  state, including Russia’s Peasants in War and Revolution and Social Control under Stalin and Khrushchev, and co-editor of the journal Revolutionary Russia.  Aaron has been an active member of the ALBA board for over a decade and chair of the Watt Essay Prize Committee since 2014. He regularly contributes the “Faces of ALBA” section to The Volunteer. 

Jo Labanyi is Professor Emerita in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at New York University. A founding editor of the Journal of Spanish Cultural Studies, she has published widely on 19th-21st-century Spanish culture. Her books include the co-edited Companion to Spanish Cinema (Blackwell, 2013) and co-authored Cultural History of Modern Literatures in Spain (Polity, 2021). She has a particular interest in the Spanish Civil War and is currently completing A Cultural History of the Spanish Civil War for Reaktion Books.

Steven Birnbaum has been a trial attorney for over 40 years in the SF Bay Area, West Coast and Hawaii and nationally recognized for his work representing injured workers under the Longshore and Harborworkers Act. He has served on various city and county boards and commissions where he lives. He has been working as a social activist addressing the problems of poverty, inadequate housing, fighting for equality and peace since his term as a VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) in Georgia in 1969 and his tenure as a staff attorney at Legal Assistance to the Elderly in SF. He served on the Board of Interfaith Workers for Justice. He served as the president of the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Law Library and has and is representing indigent asylum seekers from Central America through the SF Lawyer's Committee for Civil rights. In 1995 he, along with 10 other attorneys, founded WILG (Workplace Injury Law and Advocacy Group that has grown to over 1,000 injured workers attorneys nationally and is recognized as the preeminent workers compensation attorneys organization in the US. He has a special interest in the tragedy of the Spanish Civil War.

Anthony Geist is Professor of Spanish and Comparative Literature at the University of Washington. He received his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. Geist's research concerns the art and literature of the Spanish Civil War. He published a photo-essay on Seattle-area Lincoln Brigade veterans, coauthored with the Spanish photojournalist José Moreno, entitled Passing the Torch: The Abraham Lincoln Brigade and its Legacy of Hope / Otra cara de América: Los brigadistas y su legado de esperanza. He has also curated ALBA’s traveling exhibit, They Still Draw Pictures: Children’s Art in Wartime from the Spanish Civil War to Kosovo. The accompanying book was published in 2002. In 2006 he co-produced and co-directed a documentary film on the American volunteers who fought in the Spanish Civil War, Souls without Borders: The Untold Story of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, 1936-2006.

Josephine Nelson Yurek is a founding member of the Bronx National Organization for Women and of the Cinnamon Tree Day Care Center. Member of the board of directors of Lehman College Performing Arts Center for ten years. Retired as a high school administrator from the New York City public school system. Daughter of a veteran of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, Steve Nelson.

Daniel Czitrom is Professor of History at Mount Holyoke College, where he has taught since 1981 with a focus on recent American cultural and political history. He joined the ALBA Board in 1987 and served as its Chair from 1990-94. His latest book is Rediscovering Jacob Riis: Exposure Journalism and Photography in Turn of the Century New York (with Bonnie Yochelson, 2007). Czitrom is also the author ofMedia and the American Mind: From Morse to McLuhan (1982), which received the First Books Award from the American Historical Association and has been translated into Spanish and Chinese. He is also co-author of Out of Many: A History of the American People(Pearson Prentice Hall, 6th ed., 2008), a best selling U.S. History college textbook. In 2003 Czitrom’s historical drama, Red Bessie, (co-written with playwright Jack Gilhooley), was produced at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. It is based on the letters and experiences of two Lincoln Brigade vets, the brothers Joe and Leo Gordon

Robert S. Coale is Professeur des Universités (Professor) in Hispanic Studies at the Université de Rouen (Normandy, France). Originally from Baltimore, Maryland, he holds a B.A. in history and Spanish from Washington College. One day some thirty years ago he went off to Madrid to improve his Spanish and never looked back, eventually earning a Doctorat from the Université de Paris IV-La Sorbonne. In 1996 he actively participated in the 60th anniversary Homage to the IB in Madrid and thus began his relationship with ALBA. He has been the moderator of the ALBA listserv since 1999. His area of specialization is 20th century Spanish history, especially the Spanish Civil War, the International Brigades and the exile of Spanish Loyalists in France. He occasionally returns to the US so as not to forget how to pronounce Bawlmer.

Angela Giral was born in Madrid less than a year before the Spanish Civil War started. The family escaped from their summer residence in San Rafael, walking all night through the Segovia Forest. In 1939, they moved to Mexico, where Angela attended the National University (UNAM). In 1956, she moved to Ann Arbor, where she obtained a Masters of Library Science. In 1970, she became an American citizen. She has worked as a librarian at Princeton (Urban and Environmental Studies), Harvard (Graduate School of Design), and Columbia (Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library).  After retiring from Columbia she engaged in the conservation and processing of the private papers of her grandfather, Jose Giral Pereira, a minister of the republican government during the war, as well as in exile.  The archive, consisting of over 10,000 letters and documents, was donated by the family to Spain’s Archivo Historico Nacional in 2009. Several books have been since published based on its contents. From her early childhood, listening to the songs of the Spanish Civil War, she was in awe of the young people who gave their energy, youth, and, sometimes, their lives, to defend democracy and the republican ideals of her country when it was an early victim of fascism.

PETER MILLER is an Emmy and Peabody-award winning filmmaker whose documentaries have screened in cinemas and on television throughout the world. His films include A.K.A. DOC POMUS, JEWS AND BASEBALL: AN AMERICAN LOVE STORY, SACCO AND VANZETTI, and A CLASS APART for PBS’s American Experience, now being adapted as a feature film executive produced by Eva Longoria. His short film THE INTERNATIONALE was short-listed for an Academy Award nomination. Peter co-directed ROBERT SHAW: MAN OF MANY VOICES, winner of three Emmy Awards, for PBS American Masters, as well as the public television documentaries SOSÚA: MAKE A BETTER WORLD and REFUGEE KIDS: ONE SMALL SCHOOL TAKES ON THE WORLD. With his daughter Nora Claire Miller, he recently completed EGG CREAM, a short film about the beloved chocolate soda drink. Most recently, he co-wrote and produced BEDLAM, about the crisis in care for the severely mentally ill, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and aired on PBS Independent Lens. Peter is currently working on DO NO HARM, a 3-part PBS series about Palliative Care, as well as MARCELLA, a biography of the legendary food writer Marcella Hazan. He has also been a producer on numerous documentaries by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, including the PBS series THE WAR and JAZZ, and FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT.

Paco de Onís grew up in several Latin American countries during a time of dictatorships. He is the Executive Director and Executive Producer of Skylight, a human rights media organization dedicated to advancing social justice through storytelling. Paco's grandfather, Federico de Onís, founded the Spanish and Portuguese Studies Department at Columbia University after the first world war. He never returned to Spain after the end of the Spanish Civil War.  Paco’s film producing credits include 500 YEARS, Granito: How to Nail a Dictator, Rebel Citizen, Disruption, State of Fear, and The Reckoning.

Prior to attending law school, Ellyn Polshek worked in publishing as Managing Editor at Grossman Publishers, a Division of the Viking Press, then as a Senior Editor at Holt, Rinehart and Winston and later at William Morrow. She received her JD in 1985 at the Columbia Law School.  Following graduation, she practiced law as an Assistant District Attorney in the Appeals Bureau at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office.  She argued her cases before the Appellate Division in New York County and when necessary at the Court of Appeals in Albany.

Cynthia Young joined the ALBA board in 2020. Since 2000, she has worked at the International Center of Photography, specifically with the Robert Capa Archive. She has curated numerous exhibitions from the collection that have traveled throughout Spain and other countries in Europe and South America. Recent exhibitions include The Mexican Suitcase, the Rediscovered Negatives of the Spanish Civil War by Robert Capa, Gerda Taro and Chim; We Went Back: Photographs from Europe by Chim, 1933-1956 and Capa in Color. She recently edited the republication of Death in the Making, Capa’s 1938 photobook of images from Spain.

Jeff Chang has written extensively on culture, politics, the arts, and music. His first book, Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, was named one of the best nonfiction books of the last quarter century by Slate. A revised Young Adult edition of the book—co-written with legendary hip-hop journalist Dave “Davey D” Cook—was published in 2021. His other books include Total Chaos: The Art and Aesthetics of Hip-Hop, Who We Be: A Cultural History of Race in Post Civil Rights America, and We Gon' Be Alright: Notes On Race and Resegregation. His next project is a cultural biography of Bruce Lee called Water Mirror Echo: Bruce Lee and the Making of Asian America (HarperCollins). Considered a national expert in narrative strategy and cultural equity, he serves as a Senior Advisor at Race Forward and runs the Butterfly Lab for Immigrant Narrative Strategy

Judge Baltasar Garzón has specialized in challenging government corruption, organized crime, terrorists, state antiterrorism units, and drug lords. In 1973, Augusto Pinochet led a bloody military coup against democratically elected socialist President Salvador Allende of Chile. Pinochet’s seventeen-year reign of terror was characterized by human rights violations on a truly massive scale, including widespread disappearances and extrajudicial killings. In October 1998, Garzón made history when he seized the opportunity to indict Pinochet in Europe, when Pinochet visited London. Garzón’s campaign for justice has set a precedent that heads of state may now be tried for crimes such as torture and genocide, that no person is above the law, and that sovereign immunity does not extend to crimes against humanity. Judge Garzón has continued his work, despite being targeted for criminal prosecution himself, due to his work in investigating crimes related to the Franco regime. Garzón is the recipient of the first ALBA/Puffin Award for Human Rights Activism.

For over 40 years Joyce Horman has pressed the United States and Chilean governments, and legal authorities in both countries, to investigate and resolve the wrongful death of her husband Charles in the violent aftermath of Pinochet’s 1973 military coup.  With the CCR she sued Kissinger for cover up and collusion in Charles' wrongful death.  The movie Missing told of her husband's disappearance in the midst of Pinochet's dictatorship with the cooperation and possible direction of American military intelligence. Her Foundation produced the "Tribute to Justice" in 1973 honoring those who fought to bring Pinochet to justice for human rights crimes.

Barbara Kopple is a two-time Academy Award winning and seven-time Emmy nominated filmmaker. A director and producer of documentaries, narrative films, and commercial spots, she most recently completed the documentary Gumbo Coalition, which follows visionary Civil Rights Leaders, Marc Morial and Janet Murguia. It takes the audience on an intimate journey into their lives, homes, and the family histories that motivate their mission to achieve a more just and equitable country at a dramatic crossroads in American history. It was the center-piece and premiered at the DOC NYC Film Festival, and internationally at IDFA. She has also directed and produced upwards of forty films throughout her career, including Desert One, about the daring US Special Ops mission during the Iranian Hostage Crisis, featuring intimate interviews with President Carter, New Homeland, documenting a group of refugee children from Syria and Iraq who experience a summer camp in the Canadian wilderness, A Murder In Mansfield, This Is Everything: Gigi Gorgeous, Miss Sharon Jones!, Hot Type: 150 Years of The Nation, Running from Crazy, Woodstock: Now and Then, Wild Man Blues, Shut Up and Sing as well as her two Academy award winning films, Harlan County USA and American Dream, to name a few. In 1991, Harlan County USA was named to the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress and designated an American Film Classic. Harlan County USA was restored and preserved by the Women’s Preservation Fund and the Academy Film Archive, and featured as part of the Sundance Collection at the Sundance Film Festival in 2005. Barbara has worked with many industry heavy hitters and has put out films with HBO, PBS, VH1, A&E, STARZ, and OWN among others, as well as most of her features running theatrically. For her work, Barbara has received some awards, among them are the Los Angeles Film Critics Award, the National Society of Film Critics Award, the New York Women in Film & Television Muse Award, and most recently the Critics Choice LifeTime Achievement D.A. Pennebaker Award. In 2010, Barbara received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from American University. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the Director’s Guild of America, New York Women in Film and Television’s Honorary Board, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, Woodstock Film Festival Advisory Board, AFI Advisory Board and actively participates in organizations that address social issues and support independent filmmaking. In 2023 Barbara also received the Emmys lifetime achievement award.

Antonio Muñoz Molina is a Spanish writer and, since 1995, a full member of the Royal Spanish Academy. He studied art history at the University of Granada and journalism in Madrid. He began writing in the 1980s and his first published book, El Robinsón urbano, a collection of his journalistic work, was published in 1984. His columns have regularly appeared in El País and Die Welt.

Karen Nussbaum has been an organizer for more than 50 years. She was the founding director of 9to5, the national organization of working women; District 925, SEIU; and Working America, the community organizing arm of the AFL-CIO. Nussbaum served as the director of the U.S. Department of Labor Women’s Bureau, the highest seat in the federal government devoted to women. She is the co-author of two books and writes about women, labor, politics and culture. Nussbaum is on the board of Working America.

John Sayles is the writer and director of acclaimed independent films including Return of the Secaucus 7, Matewan, Lianna, Baby It’s You, The Brother From Another Planet, Eight Men Out, City of Hope, Passion Fish, The Secret of Roan Inish, Lone Star, Men with Guns, Limbo, Sunshine State, Casa de los Babys, Silver City and Honeydripper. Sayles has also written novels and short stories. Among his awards: John D. MacArthur Award, Eugene V. Debs Award, John Steinbeck Award, John Cassavettes Award, Ian McLellan Hunter Award. He has been nominated twice for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.

Bryan Stevenson is the founder and Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), a human rights organization in Montgomery, Alabama. Under his leadership, EJI has won major legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerating innocent death row prisoners, confronting abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill, and aiding children prosecuted as adults. Mr. Stevenson has argued and won multiple cases at the United States Supreme Court, including a 2019 ruling protecting condemned prisoners who suffer from dementia and a landmark 2012 ruling that banned mandatory life-imprisonment-without-parole sentences for all children 17 or younger. Mr. Stevenson and his staff have won reversals, relief, or release from prison for over 135 wrongly condemned prisoners on death row and won relief for hundreds of others wrongly convicted or unfairly sentenced. Mr. Stevenson is the author of the acclaimed best-seller, Just Mercy, on which the 2019 feature film of the same name is based. He is also a Professor of Law at the New York University School of Law. In 2014, Mr Stevenson was the recipient of the ALBA/Puffin Award for Human Rights Activism.