Sal Acosta specializes in the history of Latinos in the United States. He focuses on the social impact of the development of the Southwest and on the social and cultural experiences of Latinos since 1846. He is currently preparing a manuscript on interethnic marriages in Arizona (1854-1930). His quantitative and qualitative research helps to reevaluate the perception that intermarriages in the nineteenth-century Southwest occurred primarily among enterprising white men and the daughters of the old Mexican/Spanish elites.