LatinXperts: Recent Episodes
LatinXperts
A conversation with self-taught photographer Fabián Guerrero: a queer, first-generation Mexican American born in Dallas, TX. Fabián’s work both reflects and is inspired by his upbringing as a first-generation immigrant and a queer brown individual; taking from fashion, film, poems, and music, the lifestyle and everyday survival, to shed light on his family’s history and […]
“Writing Truth in Times of Fear” spotlights the MALS’ first inaugural Writer-in-Residence mónica teresa ortiz. Ortíz talks with Karma Chavez, Chair of the Department of Mexican American Latina/o Studies, about the importance of land, Texas, as well as ethnic, racial, and queer identity to their creative practice. They also offer important insights for students wanting to pursue their […]
A conversation between Dr. Angela X. Ocampo and Dr. Angie Gutierrez about Proyecto Latino. Drs. Ocampo and Gutierrez discuss their research collaborative, its mission and bold ideas. They also discuss results from their survey of Latina/o/x Texans after the 2022 Midterm Election, and their ongoing efforts to better understand the political priorities, opinions and behaviors of Latinas/os/xs in the state of Texas and beyond.
Dr. Angela X. Ocampo is an Assistant Professor in Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Twitter: @angelaxocampo
Dr. Angie Gutierrez is an incoming Assistant Professor in Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Twitter: @ae_gutierrez_
In this episode, Dr. Daisy Morales-Campos talks with Dr. Bernadine Waller about how her participation in the Intersectional Qualitative Research Methods Institute for Advanced Doctoral Students (the Institute) has impacted her research and career trajectory.
Intersectional Qualitative Research Methods Institute for Advanced Doctoral Students (IQRMI-ADS) website
Dr. Bernadine Waller LinkedIn
TEDx Talks: Hindered Help: African American Partner Violence Victims with Bernadine Waller
Being a Latino father is almost as hard as being a Latina daughter. Dr. Domino Perez discusses how her youth watching films with her father inspired her to write a book about the complex construction of Latino fatherhood in the cultural and geographic borderlands. Dr. Perez illustrates that sometimes slow methods of research are the most efficient uses of our time, our stories, and our lives.
In this episode, Karma talks with Drs. Julie Minich and Alison Kafer about their new Mellon-funded project, The Crip Narratives Collective.
Drs. Kafer and Minich discuss The Crip Narratives Collective, a regular convening of students with disabilities, postgraduate fellows, faculty members and artists over a three-year period at UT Austin. The collective will build a network of academic mentorship for people with disabilities at UT Austin and beyond.
Feminist, Queer, Crip by Alison Kafer
Radical Health by Julie A. Minich
Crip Genealogies edited by Alison Kafer and Julie A. Minich
In this episode, Karma Chávez talks with UT Professors Adela Pineda-Franco and Sarah Brayne about their new Mellon-funded project, Pido la Palabra: A Texas Prison Literature Project for Social Justice and the Literary Imagination.
Professors Pineda-Franco and Brayne discuss the importance of prison education, and the value of creating Spanish and bilingual courses for incarcerated people.
Resources / Related Links:
Texas Prison Education Initiative: https://sites.utexas.edu/texasprisoneducation/
In this episode, Karma Chávez talks with writer, Yasmín Ramírez about her new memoir, ¡Ándale, Prieta! A Love Letter to My Family, published by Lee and Low Books.
Writer Yasmín Ramírez discusses why she published her memoir, the importance of the women in her life and telling their stories, and she offers advice for those who are thinking about writing their stories.
Resources / Related Links:@YasminRamWrites www.yasminramirez.comwww.leeandlow.com/books/andale-prieta
In this episode, Karma Chávez talks with photographer Roj Rodriguez about his new book of photography, Mi Sangre, which will be out later this year from Hatje Cantz.
Photographer Roj Rodriguez talks about how we came to do the type of work he does, the meaning of his work, and the importance of media representation for Latinx/a/o people.
Rodriguez's website: https://www.rojrodriguez.com
Mi Sangre's website: https://www.hatjecantz.de/roj-rodriguez-8183-1.html
Rachel speaks with author, advocate and social entrepreneur Rudy Ruiz about his most recent neo-western horror novel, The Valley of Shadows (2022). Born in Brownsville and later graduating from Harvard University, Rudy shares how his fronterizo experiences shapes his writing, and the importance of community stories.
Rudy Ruiz is an American author, advocate and social entrepreneur. The son and grandson of Mexican immigrants, Rudy Ruiz was born in Brownsville, Texas and raised along the US-Mexico border, living in Matamoros, Mexico for extensive periods of time. He did not speak English until he entered school at the age of five. Once in school, he excelled and dreamt of growing up to be a writer, an entrepreneur, and a contributor to the wellbeing of immigrants and minorities, as well as to positive relations between diverse cultures and nations. He earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees at Harvard. Ruiz now resides in San Antonio with his wife, Heather, and their two children, Paloma and Lorenzo. To learn more about Rudy and his other published works see, https://rudyruiz.com/
Dr. González-Martin is a Folklorist and an Associate Professor of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies. She is an active affiliate faculty member of the Center for Mexican American Studies, Women and Gender Studies, and the Latino Media and Arts Program at the University of Texas. She holds a PhD in Folklore and Ethnomusicology from Indiana University, where she completed her dissertation titled, "Dreaming in Taffeta: Imagining an American Quinceañera" (2014). Her M.A. explores Mexican, Mexican American, and Chicano masculinities and verbal dueling among Mexican descent men through artistic insults known as "albures". She is a Woodrow Wilson Early Career Fellow. She does research across the United States, and Mexico.
Resources / Related Links:
https://crimereads.com/rudy-ruiz-neo-western-border/This Episode was Mixed and Mastered by Rayna Sevilla
A conversation with Houston-based artist Angel Lartigue about the use of scientific methods in performance art and about the relationship between the land of South Texas and her own body, as well as other's.
Angel Lartigue's art practice thus far has been brief (about five years), but it's also very rich. We sit down to talk about the ways in which the land of South Texas that's so connected to death and the death of migrants specifically, beckoned her. There she begins to finds ways to resurrect the dead by using scientific methods that help to highlight life among the dead. This process further expands to unlikely places like the night club, as well as galleries and other performance spaces.
Resources / Related Links: Angel Lartigue website Follow Angel Lartigue on Instagram @sub_scientist "Science at the Club: putrefaction as an artistic medium" DiverseWorks - OVERLAPPING TERRITORIES
This Episode was Mixed and Mastered by Jared Marxuach, Kate Whitmer and Amanda Willis
In this episode, Karma Chávez talks with Dr. Lydia Contreras about being a Latina immigrant in chemical engineering and the importance of working to make campus a more inclusive and equitable place.
Dr. Lydia Contreras, associate professor, holder of the Jim and Barbara Miller Endowed Faculty Fellowship in Chemical Engineering, and Managing Director of Diversity in the Office of the Provost at UT-Austin, discusses her experiences being a woman of color in STEM and her approach to doing diversity work on campus.
Resources / Related Links: Tools for Change: Boosting the Retention of Women in the STEM Pipeline Ten Latinas Making their Mark in the Stem World - Remezcla
This Episode was Mixed and Mastered by Karoline Pfeil and Will Shute
In this episode, Karma Chávez talks with Dr. Lilia Rosas of Casa de Resistencia Books and Gianna LaMorte of UT Press about how supply chain issues are impacting academic book publishing and sales.
Dr. Lilia Rosas, director of Red Salmon Arts, which houses Casa de Resistencia Books, and Gianna LaMorte, Assistant Director of Sales and Marketing at the University of Texas Press discuss how recent paper shortages and increased costs are impacting the world of academic book publishing and sales, and how this may have a disproportionate impact on BIPOC communities.
Resources / Related Links: University of Texas Press Red Salmon Arts | Casa de Resistencia Books 2021 Supply Chain Challenges Impacting Paper Supply and Costs
This episode of LatinXperts was recorded by Will Kurzner and was mixed and mastered by Clayton Faries and Morgan Honaker.
In this episode, Karma Chávez talks with Dr. Maria Cotera about her Chicana Por Mi Raza Digital collection.
Dr. Maria Cotera, co-founder of the Chicana Por Mi Raza Digital collection discusses why she created it and the kinds of materials it houses. She discusses the importance of recording a history of Chicana feminist praxis and engaging in such a praxis in the collective structure by which the collection is maintained.
Resources / Related Links:
Chicana Por Mi Raza Dr. Maria Cotera's Bio
A conversation with Michael Anthony García, a multidisciplinary artist and a key figure in the Austin Latinx art scene, about his curating and art practice. We also discuss the possibilities of art and about world-making through art, both, for the present and future.
Michael Anthony García is a multidisciplinary artist and curator based in Austin working across different genres: performance, sculpture, photography, and video, sometimes fusing them. As a key figure in the Austin Latinx art scene, García also curates (with) care by bringing people, words, and art (objects) together and elevating them. At the heart of these cojoined endeavors, there is an intersectional politics and a desire to elevate BIPOC voices. In addition to his curating practice, further evidence of this are the art magazine POCa Madre he edits and the podcast El Puente he co-hosts. We sit down to learn about his art practice, as well as his curating and caring practice, and talk about the possibilities of art for our everyday lives now and in the future.
Resources / Related Links:
Website: https://www.mrmichaelme.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrmichaelme/
POCa Madre Media: https://www.pocamadremedia.com
https://www.experimentalaction.com/
https://fuseboxfestival.com
In honor of Down Syndrome (DS) awareness month, Latinx parents share their experiences to help other new parents or caregivers navigate the journey after their child receives a DS diagnosis.
This episode is full of wisdom from parents who have a child with Down Syndrome. These perspectives are a whole lot better and relatable than a google search. So for any parent or caregiver who has a child or loved one with DS get ready to be inspired and be connected to helpful resources.
Resources / Related Links:
Austin: Down Syndrome Association of Central Texas (DSACT)
San Antonio: Down Syndrome Association of South Texas (DSASTX)
Both of the aforementioned offer a variety of programs and activities for individuals with Down syndrome and their families from birth through adulthood.
National: Down Syndrome Diagnosis Network (DSDN) can connect parents to online Facebook groups to connect with other parents.
This Is Down Syndrome offers an expansive, relatable and transformative look into what it really means to live with Down syndrome using powerful images and bite-sized engaging stories.
This episode was mix and mastered by Alejandra Arrazola.
In this episode, Karma Chávez interviews Dr. Miguel Pinedo about his research into how the deportation of others influences the substance use of US citizen Latinos.
Dr. Miguel Pinedo discusses a recent research paper published in the International Journal of Drug Policy, in which Dr. Pinedo investigates how the deportation of others influences the substance use of US citizen Latinos. He concludes that the detentions and deportations of others may in fact influence how US citizen Latinos use and abuse substances.
Resources / Related Links:
https://education.utexas.edu/faculty/miguel_pinedo_banuelos
This episode of LatinXperts was mixed and mastered by Alejandra Arrazola and Morgan Honacker.
As the fall season is upon us, nature is in transition, and so are the worlds of the living and the dead. Dr. Rachel Gonzalez-Martin shares listener stories of the supernatural, and asks: Why are stories of the supernatural so popular in Latinx communities?
Resources: Check out some other podcasts that focus on the Latinx and Texas culture and paranormal experiences and narratives.
Monstras podcast: https://www.monstraspodcast.com/podcast Brenda Salguero and Dr. Orquidea Morales use their expertise and experiences, to explore the world of Latin American and Latinx folklore, horror, and monsters
The Night Owl podcast:https://www.thenightowlpodcast.com/ Ghost Hunting and Investigations into the Paranormal in and around Austin, Texas.
In this episode, Karma Chávez interviews Dr. Carmen R. Valdez about her longitudinal research on mixed-status families.
Dr. Carmen R. Valdez discusses an article she published in the journal, Family Process, which looked at how Mexican immigrant adults and their children reacted emotionally to the events leading to the 2016 election. She explains why studying mixed-status Latino families is important and how their stresses differ from those families in which everyone shares the same immigration or citizenship status. She also insists that while it is important to understand the precarity and stress these families face, it is equally significant to emphasize the ways that these families can continue to thrive.
Resources / Related Links:
Learn more about Carmen Valdez, Ph.D.
Emotional Reactions and Coping of Mexican Mixed-Status Immigrant Families in Anticipation of the 2016 Presidential Election
In this episode, Karma Chávez interviews Professor Sandy Magaña about her research related to health disparities, health equity, and Latino children who have been diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Professor Magaña shares her research about some of the disparities Latino children and families face vis-a-vis white families both in obtaining a diagnosis and when a child receives an Autism Spectrum Disorder diagnosis. She also defines health disparities and health equity, and why the latter is so important to try to achieve. Professor Magaña points out the long-term material impacts of these health disparities for Latinos, and she offers some directions for how different people can make meaningful interventions that move toward health equity.
Resources / Related Links:
https://socialwork.utexas.edu/directory/sandy-magana/
https://socialwork.utexas.edu/projects/efficacy-of-the-asd-screening-and-parent-engagement-aspen-intervention-program-in-low-resource-communities/
In this episode, Karma Chávez interviews Dr. Rubén Parra-Cardona about his recent co-authored study about the importance of faith-based organizations in taking leadership roles in implementing physical and mental health care initiatives.
Dr. Parra-Cardona discusses his recent work that advocates for the importance of faith-based organizations in taking leadership roles in implementing physical and mental health care initiatives. Dr. Parra-Cardona explains how the field of “implementation science,” or “the study of methods and strategies to promote the uptake of interventions that have proven effective into routine practice, with the aim of improving population health,” has been woefully ineffective in accounting for disparities and discrimination faced by marginalized groups such as Latinx immigrants. He also offers an example from his work with a parenting program to make a case for the need to consider faith-based groups as vital implementation partners, even as faith-based groups are still growing in their commitments to some progressive social issues.
Resources / Related Links:
Ruben Parra-Cardona, Ph.D. Profile
Implementing a church-based parenting intervention to promote NIDA prevention science among Latinxs (2023)
This episode of LatinXperts was mixed and mastered by Ean Herrera.
In this episode, Karma Chávez interviews Professor Nelly Salgado de Snyder about her recent study of stress among healthcare providers.
Professor Salgado de Snyder shares her recent research that explores stress, anxiety, depressive symptomatology, and coping behaviors among healthcare workers and providers who serve underprivileged groups such as immigrants, refugees, people living in poverty, homeless, and other socially vulnerable populations amid the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. Karma and Prof. Salgado de Snyder also discuss the gendered implications of the findings as well as what they mean for policymakers.
Resources / Related Links:
How Stressed Are Health Providers During the COVID-19 Pandemic
This episode of LatinXperts was recorded by Karoline Pfeil and was mixed and mastered by Karoline Pfeil and Morgan Honaker.
In this episode, Dr. Karma Chávez interviews Professor Rogelio Saenz about his research documenting the impact of COVID-19 on Latinx communities in the US.
Dr. Karma Chávez and Professor Rogelio Saenz discuss the reasons why COVID-19 has hit Latinx communities so hard and why that impact has been disproportionate. They also consider what can be done to lessen the impact as well as where future research needs to go.
Resources / Related Links:
A Milestone of Misery: More Than 100K US Latinos Have Died From COVID-19
COVID-19’s Surging Impact on Latinos: A Glimpse Into August 2020
How a professor in Texas tracked the undercounting of COVID-19 cases among Hispanics, and why the Rio Grande Valley is hard hit
Karma R. Chávez (she/her) is associate professor and chair in the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at the University of Texas at Austin | @queermigrations
Rogelio Sáenz (he/him) is a sociologist and demographer at the University of Texas at San Antonio, where he is professor in the Department of Demography. | @RogelioSaenz42
This episode of LatinXperts was recorded, mixed, and mastered by Kate Whitmer and Ean Herrera.
In this episode, Drs. Vanessa Errisuriz, Marisol McDaniel, and Alice Villatoro discuss how COVID-19 drastically impacted Texas Latinx college students’ educational experiences, including ability and motivation to learn, academic outcomes, and financial stability.
Changes in the structure of higher education from in-person learning to virtual learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic may have created additional challenges to Latinx college students’ educational experiences and plans. School closures and the transition to remote learning due to the pandemic are likely to widen the achievement gap already experienced by students from low socioeconomic and minority backgrounds. With the discovery of new COVID-19 variants, the pandemic will continue to disproportionately and negatively impact Latinx students. Drs. Errisuriz, McDaniel, and Villatoro discuss strategies that can be used to best support Latinx students.
Dr. Vanessa Errisuriz received her Ph.D. in Health Behavior and Health Education from the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focuses on addressing the disproportionate burden of obesity and obesity-related chronic illness among youth and young adults from marginalized populations, including Latinx and rural communities. She is currently a Research Associate with the Latino Research Institute at The University of Texas at Austin.
Dr. Marisol McDaniel received her DrPH in Community Health Practice from the University of Texas School of Public Health in 2018. She has experience with planning, implementing, and evaluating healthy lifestyle interventions and managing eHealth applications. Dr. McDaniel is interested in sustainable structural and digital interventions that promote food security and diet quality. She aims to prevent and decrease the burden of chronic disease for marginalized communities in Texas. She is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at The University of Texas at Austin.
Dr. Alice Villatoro received her PhD in Health Services from the UCLA and completed postdoctoral training in Psychiatric Epidemiology at Columbia University. She is a mental health services researcher whose work centers on understanding the causes of disparities in access to and utilization of mental health services among racial/ethnic minority populations, including immigrant Latinx communities. Currently, she is a Research Assistant Professor at the Latino Research Institute at UT Austin.
This episode of LatinXperts was recorded by Will Kurzner and mixed and mastered by Kaia Daniel, Karoline Pfeil, and Sofia Salter.
In this episode, Dr. Rachel González-Martin and Dr. Belem López discuss the intersections of gender, respectability, and mothers in how Latinx communities use words and terms related to madres.
Resources / Related Links: Un Desmadre Positivo: How Jenni Rivera Played Music ( D. Vargas in Contemporary Latina/o Media: Production, Circulation, Politics edited by Arlene M. Dávila, Yeidy M. Rivero)
Latina/Chicana Mothering by Smith Silva, Dorsía. / Edited by Dorsía Smith Silva.
"Signs You Grew Up with a Latina Mom" - Pero LikePero Like
Dr. Rachel González-Martin is a folklorist and Associate Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. You can follow Dr. González-Martin on Twitter @Dr_Rachel_ATX
Dr. Belem López is a psycholinguist and cognitive psychologist. She is also an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. You can follow Dr. López on Twitter @melebzepol
This episode of LatinXperts was recorded by Max Edwards and mixed and mastered by Max Edwards, Amanda Willis, and Will Kurzner.
In this episode of LatinXperts, Dr. María Cotera has a wide-ranging conversation about the past, present, and future of Latina/o Digital Humanities with Dr. Gabriela Baeza Ventura and Dr. Carolina A. Villarroel of the University of Houston and Arte Público Press.
In this podcast, we discuss the importance of recovering, preserving, and sharing Latina/o cultural heritage through emerging digital tools, and how digital humanities changes when we shift the center to Latina/o communities and their knowledge practices. Dr. Baeza Ventura and Dr. Villarroel discuss their experience working on recovery projects with Arte Público Press, and how their early efforts to digitize Spanish-language newspapers prepared them to take a leading role in establishing a center for Latina/o Digital Humanities, a project that is funded by a grant from the Mellon Foundation. Baeza Ventura and Villarroel reflect on the current state of Latina/o Digital Humanities and on how their commitment to community and their identities as Latinx scholars shape their approach to digital preservation.
Resources / Related Links:
A home for Latino digital humanities at the University of Houston Q&A with Dr. Carolina Villarroel of the Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage Project María Cotera, “Nuestra Autohistoria: Toward a Chicana Digital Praxis,” Special Issue of American Quarterly: Toward a Critically Engaged Digital Practice: American Studies and the Digital Humanities, vol. 70, no. 3 (Sept. 2018). For information on the U.S. Latina/o Digital Humanities project
A brief list of Latinx-focused Digital Humanities projects:
Arte Publico-supported projects Chicana por mi Raza Border Studies Archive Bracero Archive Chicana Diasporic Refusing to Forget Celebrating Selena Civil Rights in Black and Brown Digital El Diario East of East - El Monte Digital Project The Latina History Project Adobe Structures in San Antonio Jotería Archive Veteranas y Rucas Voces Oral History Center
This episode of LatinXperts was recorded by Ean Herrera and mixed and mastered by Harper Carlton.
p1nkstar is, without a doubt, Austin’s Queer Pop Princess, and the tiara that she beautifully wears is a symbol of a lineage of diva pop stars that we have been grown up and danced along with. Yet her presence on the club scene is expansive in its ability to not only dismantle the gender binary system, with the glamour befitting of a Princess, but is also inserting a politics that centers transgender people of color into its performance repertoire. Let’s let P1nkstar guide us into her glam world, with saccharine-infused beats and songs that challenge our understanding of pop music.
Resources / Related Links: GIRLS LIKE US PERFORMANCE P1nkstar's website P1nkstar's instagram
Laura G. Gutiérrez (she/her/hers/they/ella/elle) is a Mexican and Latinx performance studies, visual studies, and cultural studies scholar. Gutiérrez was born in Nuevo Ideal, Durango, Mexico, and, in 1977, migrated to Chicago. She currently resides in Austin, TX, but she’s also made homes in Tucson, AZ and Mexico City. Gutiérrez is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at The University of Texas at Austin where she teaches courses related to (popular) culture. Her research revolves around the examination of gender, race, and sexuality in Latinx and Mexican performance and visual art. She is the author of Performing Mexicanidad: Vendidas y Cabareteras on the Transnational Stage (U of Texas Press, 2010), as well a number of articles, book chapters, and catalog essays. Because of her deep commitment to contemporary art and culture-makers, Gutiérrez is on the board of and part of the curating team of OUTsider Fest, an Austin-based queer transmedia nonprofit, and, occasionally, collaborates with artists.
p1nkstar™️ (ur fav electr0nic pop superstar!!) creates a world far removed from this dimensions binaries through music and conceptual shows mixing saccharine beats with subversive lyrics, tiaras with ball gags, and body hair with hypnotic ponytails. Merging hyperpop with neo-perreo and club, she has been described as “early Aughts Paris Hilton on Hello Kitty steroids” by The Austin Chronicle, who recently crowned her as their Queer Pop Princess. In her live performances p1nkstar affectionately delivers pure pop performance, mixing witty vocals with electronic beats and video interludes with choreographed numbers and back-up dancers. Since her performance debut in late 2016, p1nkstar has shared bills with Charli XCX, Crystal Waters, The Ladies of LCD Soundsystem, Alok V. Menon, Dorian Electra, JD Samson, OSHUN, and Sateen.
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p1nkstar released her debut EP “Number 1 Hits!” March 6 2020, featuring five songs produced in collaboration with Mr.Kitty, Ben Aqua & Boy Sim. Bringing her Latinx roots to the increasingly popular hyperpop genre, p1nkstar lays out a bilingual story that touches on the complexities of her queer, trans and immigrant identities in our hyper-mediated digital world. The EP consists of futuristic beats and highly-processed vocals in which p1nkstar renders and invites her listeners into a queer futurity she envisions.
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Since moving from Mexico in 2014, p1nkstar has rapidly become an emblematic figure in the Texas nightlife scene by opening inclusive spaces that center that work of queer and trans artists of color in a city that is rapidly becoming whiter and straighter. p1nkstar has received two Best of Austin awards for her space-making work in the arts and nightlife & has been presented as the future of nightlife by The Austin Chronicle.
Not all language is created equal! In this episode, Dr. Rachel González-Martin and Dr. Belem López discuss how Latinx communities use expletives to show love and care to their closest friends.
Additional Resources:
History of Swear Words | Official Trailer | Netflix
9 Insults Only Latinos Use As Compliments
Dr. Rachel González-Martin is a folklorist and Associate Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. You can follow Dr. González-Martin on Twitter @Dr_Rachel_ATX
Dr. Belem López is a Psycholinguist researcher. She is also an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. You can follow Dr. López on Twitter @melebzepol
In the summer of 2019, Puerto Ricans rebelled and ousted their governor in what became known as the Verano Boricua. Dr. Marisol LeBrón explains the lessons learned.
In this episode, Dr. Marisol LeBrón discusses her new book, Against Muerto Rico: Lessons From the Verano Boricua, which will be out in February 2021 from the Puerto Rican collective, Editora Educación Emergente. She explains what the Verano Boricua (Puerto Rican Summer) was, why she chose the title for her book, and suggests some of the key takeaways are resisting colonial capitalism in order to foster a life affirming future for the archipelago.
Resources / Related Links:
The Leaked Texts at the Heart of Puerto Rico’s Massive Protests
The Protests in Puerto Rico Are About Life and Death
Puerto Rico’s Multiple Solidarities: Emergent Landscapes and the Geographies of Protest
reVolucionA
Marisol LeBrón is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of Policing Life and Death: Race, Violence, and Resistance, in Puerto Rico and co-editor of Aftershocks of Disaster: Puerto Rico Before and After the Storm.
Karma R. Chávez is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at UT.
Following the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police, protests swept the U.S. and countries around the world. While people were taking to the streets and social media to say that Black Lives Matter, many reggaeton artists, particularly the genre’s biggest stars, were curiously silent. How do we explain this? Why does a genre born out of Afro-diasporic musical traditions and cultures need a reckoning about race? In this episode, we’ll discuss reggaeton’s past and present to unpack what makes reggaeton Black music and what the genre must do to combat racism, including within its own ranks.
Gata is a Panamanian-American multimedia artist from Boston and the creator of Reggaeton Con La Gata. As a creator her work focuses on reggaeton history, pop culture and sex positivity.
Marisol LeBrón is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of Policing Life and Death: Race, Violence, and Resistance, in Puerto Rico and co-editor of Aftershocks of Disaster: Puerto Rico Before and After the Storm.
Additional Resources Reggaeton Con La Gata
Why Urbano Artists’ Scarce Comments on the #BLM Movement Are a Problem
Reggaeton needed a racial reckoning. Afro-Latinos are leading it.
ChocQuibTown's Goyo Pens Open Letter on Black Lives Matter: 'Speak Up ... Without Fear of Being Criticized'
Join Danielle Clealand and Victoria DeFrancesco Soto as they discuss how Latinos across the country voted in the 2020 election. They discuss turnout, state differences, political ground games and how a diverse set of voters helped to elect President-elect Biden.
Our LatinXperts discuss how Latinos in different states voted this November and why we see such diverse voting behavior. We discuss Florida and areas of Texas where Latinos supported Trump, but also emphasize the ways in which turnout among Latinos was consequential in states such as Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania. We also discuss racial differences and how the media focuses on Trump support rather than the overwhelming support for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
Danielle Pilar Clealand is an associate professor of Mexican American and Latino Studies at UT Austin and holds a courtesy appointment in African and African Diaspora Studies. She studies racial politics and Black consciousness in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean and the United States and received her PhD in political science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Follow Dr. Clealand on Twitter: @ClealandPhD
Victoria DeFrancesco Soto is Assistant Dean for Civic Engagement and a lecturer at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at The University of Texas at Austin, where she was selected as one of UT's Game Changers. She is also a faculty affiliate of the Department of Mexican American and Latino Studies and the Center for Mexican American Studies. She received her PhD in political science from Duke University.
Follow Dr. DeFrancesco Soto on Twitter: @DrVMDS
The COVID-19 pandemic has greatly impacted daily life for Texas college students, increasing feelings of stress, anxiety, and depression and reducing opportunities to engage in healthy behaviors. College campuses provide students regular access to mental health, food, and recreational services, but the reach of these services is currently limited. Strategic public health plans are necessary to address the emerging needs of students during this deadly pandemic.
In this episode, Drs. Vanessa Errisuriz, Marisol McDaniel, and Alice Villatoro discuss the number of new cases of COVID-19 in Texas and the unintended consequences of COVID-19 on Texas college students’ health-related outcomes and behaviors (e.g., depression, food insecurity, physical activity).
They also identify resources and strategies to help students and their families stay safe and healthy during the pandemic and answer questions about COVID-19 posed by students they work with. They conclude with a discussion of policies that could be enacted to improve students’ well-being during this pandemic.
Vanessa L. Errisuriz Dr. Vanessa Errisuriz received her Ph.D. in Health Behavior and Health Education from the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focuses on addressing the disproportionate burden of obesity and obesity-related chronic illness among youth and young adults from marginalized populations, including Latinx and rural communities. She is currently a Research Associate with the Latino Research Institute at The University of Texas at Austin.
Marisol McDaniel Dr. Marisol McDaniel received her DrPH in Community Health Practice from the University of Texas School of Public Health in 2018. She has experience with planning, implementing, and evaluating healthy lifestyle interventions and managing eHealth applications. Dr. McDaniel is interested in sustainable structural and digital interventions that promote food security and diet quality. She aims to prevent and decrease the burden of chronic disease for marginalized communities in Texas. She is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at The University of Texas at Austin.
Alice Villatoro Dr. Alice Villatoro received her PhD in Health Services from the UCLA and completed postdoctoral training in Psychiatric Epidemiology at Columbia University. She is a mental health services researcher whose work centers on understanding the causes of disparities in access to and utilization of mental health services among racial/ethnic minority populations, including immigrant Latinx communities. Currently, she is a Research Assistant Professor at the Latino Research Institute at UT Austin.
In early November of each year, people of Latin American descent create ofrendas for their dearly departed loved ones. Dr. Rachel González-Martin helps us to learn about where this celebration comes from and where it might be headed in the future.
In this episode, Dr. Rachel González-Martin discusses the origins of Day of the Dead in Mexico and other Latin American countries and talks about the different meanings of the rituals for particular groups. She also helps listeners to understand the similarities and differences between Halloween and Day of the Dead, and considers the seasonal proliferation of calavera masks, place mats, hand towels and other items in the United States. She concludes with some thoughts about where this tradition may be heading.
Dr. Rachel González-Martin is associate professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at UT. She has a PhD in folklore and ethnomusicology, and is incoming editor of the journal, Western Folklore. She’s author of Quinceañera Style: Social Belonging and Latinx Consumer Identities.
Additional Resources: Mexic-Arte Museum Day of the Dead in the USA Days of the Dead Community Celebration at the Oakland Museum of California
Over the past several weeks, leftist organizing and academic communities in places like New York, Madison, and Indianapolis have been dealing with the aftermath of revelations that some of the loudest and ‘wokest’ members of their communities, Jessica Krug, CV Vitolo, and Satchuel Cole were actually white people masquerading as black. This type of racial or ethnic fraud is, unfortunately, not new. Many made connections to earlier revelations from 2015 about the Spokane NAACP’s former director, Rachel Dolezal’s similar antiblack race fakery and UC-Riverside Professor and radical feminist Andrea Smith’s false claim to Cherokee heritage, a claim she still makes despite being asked not to by the Cherokee nation. What’s up with these frauds?
Joseph M. Pierce (Cherokee Nation) is Associate Professor at Stony Brook University. He is author of Argentine Intimacies: Queer Kinship in an Age of Splendor (SUNY Press, 2019).
Zaire Z. Dinzey-Flores is an Associate Professor of Sociology and Latino &Caribbean Studies at Rutgers University and a member of Black Latinas Know. Her research focuses on understanding how the urban built environment mediates race, class, and social inequality.
Follow this week's guests on Twitter: Joseph M. Pierce @pepepierce Zaire Z. Dinzey-Flores @zairedinzey
Catch Up on the Issue Shocking Details Emerge on Indy Activist Who Faked Life as a Black Woman. White US professor Jessica Krug admits she has pretended to be Black for years.
Additional Resources Open letter to Elizabeth Warren from Cherokee citizens Indigenous woman scholars join in open letter to denounce Andrea Smith. Essay By Joseph M. Pierce: "In Search of an Authentic Indian: Notes on the Self" Article By Joseph M. Pierce: “Adopted: Trace, Blood, and Native Authenticity.” A Third Step (The CV Dossier) TBV Statement on Persons Engaging in False Racial Representation
Public opinion polls consistently report data by the categories of white, black, and Latino. This approach erases the experiences of Afro-Latinos, who reportedly make up nearly ¼ of the US Latino population. How do such polls miss the mark on Latino public opinion? What would it look like if Afro-Latinos were centered in Latino politics?
Danielle Clealand received her Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in Political Science and joined the faculty at Florida International University in 2012. Her research examines comparative racial politics, group consciousness, black public opinion and racial inequality with a focus on the Spanish-speaking Caribbean and the United States.
Dr. Clealand’s book, The Power of Race in Cuba: Racial Ideology and Black Consciousness during the Revolution, winner of the 2018 Best Book Award from the Race, Ethnicity and Politics Section of the American Political Science Association and W.E.B. DuBois Distinguished Book Award from the National Conference of Black Political Scientists, examines racial ideology and the institutional mechanisms that support racial inequality in Cuba as well as black public opinion. Previously an associate professor in the Department of Politics and international Relations at Florida International University, Dr. Clealand will begin as an Associate Professor in Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at the University of Texas at Austin in fall 2020.
Karma Chávez is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at UT.
Follow this week's guests on Twitter: Karma: @queermigrations Danielle: @ClealandPhD
Visit Dr. Clealand's website at danielleclealand.com
Additional Resources I’m Afro-Latino, but I can’t join both the black and Hispanic caucuses in Congress. That must change. Why This Census of US Afro-Latinos Is Groundbreaking afrolatin@ forum Afro-Latino: A deeply rooted identity among U.S. Hispanics
Many Latinxs, especially from younger generations, have come out strongly in support of the movement for Black Lives. For many, they’ve approached this activism from a model of Black-Brown solidarity. But where does this model leave Afro-Latinxs? In this episode we interrogate the question: what is wrong with those signs that say Latinxs for Black Lives?
Karma R. Chávez is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at UT.
Paul Joseph López Oro will start a position as an assistant professor at Smith College this fall. He teaches courses on Black Latin American and U.S. Black Latinx social movements, Black diaspora theories and ethnographies, and Black feminisms/queer theory. His research interests include Black politics in Latin America, the Caribbean and U.S. AfroLatinidades, Black Latinx LGBTQ movements and performances, and Black transnationalism. He is working on his first book manuscript, Hemispheric Black Indigeneity: The Queer Politics of Self-Making Garifuna New York, an ethnographic and oral history study on how gender and sexuality shape the ways in which Garifuna New Yorkers of Central American transgenerational descent negotiate, perform and articulate their multiple subjectivities as Black, indigenous and Latinx.
Twitter Karma: @QueerMigrations Pablo: @BlackCatrachoBK
Resources Gentefied’s Julissa Calderon: "It’s Time for Latinxs to Step up for Black Lives Matter" The Latino Community Is Finally Coming to Grips With Its Own Racism Latinos must confront 'ingrained' anti-black racism amid George Floyd protests, some urge Afro-Latin@s in Movement: Critical Approaches to Blackness and Transnationalism in the Americas Neither Enemies nor Friends: Latinos, Blacks, Afro-Latinos The Afro-Latin@ Reader: History and Culture in the United States Theorizing Race in the Americas: Douglass, Sarmiento, Du Bois, and Vasconcelos
The history of Latinx people in the United States is one marked by criminalization and police violence, yet efforts to address police brutality and repression are seldom understood as “Latinx issues.” How does anti-black racism and assimilationist tendencies within mainstream Latinx politics and media downplay the problem of police violence? How can a focus on questions of policing help us think about issues of racial difference, citizenship, and solidarity within Latinx communities?
Aaron G. Fountain, Jr. Aaron G. Fountain, Jr. is a Ph.D. Candidate at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. He has done freelance writing for Al Jazeera America, Latino Rebels, Black Perspectives, The Hill, Medium, and others.
Marisol LeBrón Marisol LeBrón is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of Policing Life and Death: Race, Violence, and Resistance, in Puerto Rico and co-author, along with Yarimar Bonilla, of Aftershocks of Disaster: Puerto Rico Before and After the Storm. She is currently completing a short bilingual book entitled, Against Muerto Rico: Lessons from the Verano Boricua, about how Puerto Ricans are resisting colonialism and fighting to foster a life-affirming future for the archipelago.
Additional resources:
Latinx Narratives on Police Brutality, Respectability Politics, and Historical Erasure Riot Shaming by Latinos Needs to Stop Forgotten Latino Urban Riots and Why They Can Happen Again Reading Towards Abolition: A Reading List on Policing, Rebellion, and the Criminalization of Blackness Policing Los Angeles: Race, Resistance, and the Rise of the LAPD
Dr. Belem López and Dr. Rachel González-Martin discuss how racist language can go unnoticed in Latinx families. Drawing on their own lives, they will share experiences of colorism and racist dichos (traditional sayings) from their childhoods spent in Texas and California.
Belem López Dr. López received her Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from Texas A&M University in 2015. Afterwards she was awarded the Carlos E. Castañeda Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Center for Mexican American Studies at The University of Texas from 2015-2016. Currently, she is an assistant professor in the department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies and an affiliate in the Center for Mexican American Studies and the department of psychology. Dr. López is also the director of the LLAMA: Psycholinguistic and Sociolinguistic Laboratory.
Dr. López's research program focuses on bilingualism; particularly on how knowing and using multiple languages can shape cognition in terms of creativity, problem solving, decision-making, and language access. While studying Spanish-English bilinguals in the United States, especially Latina/os in the southwestern United States, she observed that bilinguals are not homogeneous. For this reason, Dr. López became interested in observing individual differences within bilinguals. She examines how early linguistic and cultural experiences (e.g., informal translation) have long-term cognitive and linguistic outcomes. She is committed to expanding the current psycholinguistic literature on bilingualism to include more individual differences in the areas of creativity, code-switching, cross-language activation, decision-making, and problem solving. Dr. López’s goals is to conduct research that better understands how early language experiences, particularly in Latinx communities, can affect the way language is processed, stored, and retrieved, while understanding how language use also affects cognition. Other interests include: humor, semantics, figurative language, creativity, and Latinx psychology.
Rachel González-Martin Dr. González-Martin holds a Ph.D. in Folklore & Ethnomusicology from Indiana University. Her research focuses on the verbal and material traditions of communities coming-of-age in the American Latino Diaspora. Her work looks at personal-experience-narratives, body art, materiality and self-portraiture with regard to gender, sexual identities, race, and socioeconomic status. Her teaching interests include courses on Latino expressive culture across the U.S., engaged ethnographic fieldwork, and Critical Latino Folkloristics. She is currently working on a book manuscript that explores the intersection of consumer citizenship and Latino identity in the 21st century titled, Coming Out Latina: Quinceañera Style and Latina/o Consumer Identities.
Additional Resources
Yalitza Aparicio Embraces the Term ‘Prieta,’ Sparks Discussion on the Word’s Meaning
Anne Charity Hudley's live Youtube discussion talking about about racial linguistic justice.
The Vocal Fries Pod
Mike Mena's Youtube page - The Social Life of Language
The mass consumption of particular kinds of Latinx popular culture can play a role in the erasure of blackness and perpetuate a sentiment of anti-blackness in Latinx communities. How can we reverse the top-down movement of culture, which begins with cultural industries and trickles down to the consumers, and instead create cultural flow from below by using popular culture to have difficult conversations about issues of importance to us? We model what this looks like during this conversation, where we'll dig into our Abuelas' complicated love for Celia Cruz.
Laura G. Gutiérrez Laura G. Gutiérrez is Associate Professor in the Department of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies at The University of Texas at Austin, with affiliations in CWGS, LGBTQ studies, LLILAS, CMAS, and the Latino Media Arts Program. Her research and teaching interests are in Mexican and Latinx performance studies and visual culture studies; popular culture; feminist theory; queer theory; critical race theory. Gutiérrez is the author of Performing Mexicanidad: Vendidas y Cabareteras on the Transnational Stage and she is completing a monograph on queer intimacies in contemporary Latinx visual art, performance art, and video/film work, as well as another one on racial and sexual panics in mid-twentieth century Mexico through an analysis of films from the era.
Jesús I. Valles Jesús I. Valles is a queer Mexican immigrant writer-performer from Cd. Juarez, México/El Paso, TX. Jesús is a 2019 Lambda Literary fellow, a 2019 fellow of the Sewanee Writers' Conference, a 2018 Undocupoets fellow, and a 2018 Tin House scholar. They have received support from Fine Arts Work Center, Community of Writers at Squaw Valley, Idyllwild Arts, and The Poetry Incubator. Their work is published in The New Republic, Palabritas, The Acentos Review, Quarterly West, Tin House, and BOAAT. They are the author and performer of the solo show, (Un)Documents.
For additional information, reading materials and resources, please visit:
- Miriam Jiménez Roman and Juan Flores, The Afro-Latin@ Reader: History and Culture in the United States, Duke University Press, 2010
- Afro-Peruvian Music, Art, Performance: Nicomedes Santa Cruz, Victoria Santa Cruz, Susana Baca. Victoria Santa Cruz, “Me gritaron Negra” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZBHvMaTiuU
- The African Presence in Mexico: From Yanga to the Present, an exhibit organized by the National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago: https://www.si.edu/newsdesk/releases/african-presence-m-xico-yanga-present-opens-anacostia-community-museum-nov-8
- Alan Pelaez López, “The Principles of Pride: The Riot Black and Indigenous Trans People Deserve.” Autostraddle Follow Alan @migrantscribble on Instagram and @MigrantScribble on Twitter
- Eduardo Cepeda, “Cri-Cri El Grillito Cantor is Beloved by Mexican Children, But It Has an Unexamined Problematic Past” Remezcla Follow Eduardo on Twitter @EduardoSCepeda