CSRC Newsletter - November 2014

The CSRC congratulates Chicano writer Luis Rodríguez on his appointment as Los Angeles’s new Poet Laureate! Mayor Eric Garcetti made the announcement on October 8, naming Rodríguez as the second to hold the two-year position. The program was established in August 2012 to enhance the appreciation of the literary arts in Los Angeles and to encourage the expression of L.A. culture. Who better to serve in this capacity than Rodríguez, who is such a vital element of the city’s literary arts scene? Best known for Always Running, his memoir of gang life, Rodríguez has also authored award-winning poetry and fiction, and he is the proprietor of Tía Chucha Press, which runs a cultural center and bookstore in Sylmar. With this appointment Mayor Garcetti affirms the crucial roles that Chicanos play in Los Angeles as laborers, cultural workers, and community builders. We applaud his decision, and we appreciate the mayor’s attention to the literary arts.

 

At the CSRC we also have been turning our attention to literary matters with “Documenting LA,” an oral history project targeting early and mid-career Chicano and Latino writers in Los Angeles. This project trains students as community historians and archivists; they learn to take and transcribe oral histories and to develop and process archival collections. Three local writers have already donated their papers to the CSRC through “Documenting LA,” including journalist Hector Tobar, who contributed his collection in March 2014. Over the course of this academic year we plan to interview six more writers and archive their collections as we work to establish the CSRC as a galvanizing force in the literary life of Los Angeles.

 

As always, however, our work at the CSRC spans the disciplines. Read on to see what we’re up to this month, and come visit us in Haines Hall whenever you’re on campus.

 

Marissa K. López

Interim Director and Associate Professor

 

 

Spotlight: Daniel Enrique Pérez on "Toward a Mariposa Consciousness"

Preview an essay in the Fall 2014 issue of Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies by Daniel Enrique Pérez, associate professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. Pérez discusses the use of butterfly iconography in cultural texts to demonstrate how butterflies as metaphors for queer Chicanos and Latinos—or mariposas—can facilitate a mariposa consciousness, a decolonial site grounded in an awareness of the social location, social relations, and history of the mariposa subject.

 

CSRC director to receive community service award

CSRC director Chon A. Noriega is the 2014 Los Angeles recipient of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund's (MALDEF) Excellence in Community Service award. Noriega is one of three who will be honored at a gala in Los Angeles on November 5. The other recipients are the Honorable Gloria Molina, first district supervisor, Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, and Lois D. Thompson, partner at Proskauer Rose LLP. For more information, visit the MALDEF website.

 

Welcome, CSRC postdoctoral scholars for 2014-15!

The CSRC welcomes this year’s postdoctoral visiting scholars. They are Leticia Alvarado, assistant professor of American studies and ethnic studies at Brown University; Ernesto Chávez, associate professor of history at the University of Texas, El Paso; Cecilia Fajardo-Hill, art historian and curator in modern and contemporary art; Carlos M. Haro, CSRC assistant director emeritus; Juan Carlos Herrera, PhD recipient in comparative ethnic studies, UC Berkeley; Miriam Melton-Villanueva, assistant professor of history at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas; and Lindsay Pérez Huber, assistant professor of social and cultural analysis of education at Cal State Long Beach. To read more about them and the research they will be doing while in residence, visit the CSRC website.

 

Chávez receives award from American Historical Association

The CSRC congratulates Ernesto Chávez, associate professor of history at the University of Texas, El Paso and this year’s CSRC visiting researcher through the UCLA Institute of American Cultures, on receiving a 2014 Equity Award (Individual) from the American Historical Association. Equity Awards are given to individuals and institutions that have achieved excellence in recruiting and retaining underrepresented racial and ethnic groups into the history profession. More information can be found on the website.

 

CSRC presents to student residential community

On October 7 CSRC interim director Marissa K. Lopez and CSRC communications and academic programs officer Rebecca Epstein made a presentation to undergraduate students living in the Chican@/Latin@ Studies Theme Community in Sproul residential hall. Students in attendance were primarily first-year and transfer students and therefore unfamiliar with the CSRC Library and the CSRC’s research projects and public programs. The UCLA Office of Residential Life oversees a variety of theme communities, which are designed to ease students’ transition into university life.

 

Noriega gives lecture at Cornell University

On October 28 CSRC director Chon A. Noriega presented the lecture “‘Cornell on Trial’: The University and the Creative Arts, Revisited” at Cornell University. In 1993-94, CSRC Noriega was a visiting scholar at Cornell in the Hispanic American Studies Program (now the Latina/o Studies Program), where he co-curated Revelaciones/Revelations: Hispanic Art of Evanescence, an exhibition that sparked a student protest that led to a student takeover of Day Hall and the eventual creation of the Latino Living Center. Noriega’s lecture was based on that experience. See also CSRC in the News (below).

 

Ortiz publishes opinion piece on “white Hispanics”

“Latino and Race: Together and Separately,” an opinion piece by Vilma Ortiz, professor of sociology and CSRC Faculty Advisory Committee member, appeared on the Latino Rebels website on October 1. Ortiz argues that to discuss “white Hispanics” means to discuss two issues: being Latino in the U.S. context, and the variation in skin color among Latinos. Ortiz states that these issues need to be considered together as well as separately in order to understand the consequences of being dark-skinned in a society that still privileges whiteness. Read the piece here.

 

Huerta joins faculty at Cal Poly Pomona

The CSRC congratulates Alvaro Huerta on his recent tenure-track appointment as an assistant professor in the Urban and Regional Planning and Ethnic and Women’s Studies programs at Cal Poly Pomona. Huerta was a CSRC visiting scholar from fall 2010 through spring 2014.

 

CSRC, AISC, and AASC to sell publications at ASA Conference

The CSRC, the UCLA American Indian Studies Center, and the UCLA Asian American Studies Center will be selling their publications in the booksellers’ hall at the American Studies Association Conference, November 6–9, at the Westin Bonaventure. Stop by booth #310 and say hello! For more information about the conference, visit the conference website.

 

Velasco to show work at BENT-CON

CSRC staff member Christopher A. Velasco will be displaying two of his photographic pieces, The Pleasure Self and Fulfillment Issues, at BENT-CON’s fourth annual Pop-Up Gallery exhibition. Velasco says his pieces reference “the longing for sexual satisfaction and fantasy of intimacy, in which the true element of horror begins.” BENT-CON, which will take place November 7–9 at the Los Angeles Marriott Burbank Airport convention center, “celebrates and recognizes LGBTQ (and Allies) contributions to pop-culture and geekdom.” For more information, visit the conference website.

 

Images of lost Carrillo mural sought

Museo Eduardo Carrillo is seeking images that can be used to reconstruct the whitewashed mural Birth, Death, and Regeneration by Eduardo Carrillo, which was located in the Palomar Arcade in Santa Cruz.  The mural was painted in 1976 and destroyed without warning in 1979 over the course of a single weekend. The museum, which hopes to gather as many photos or slides of the mural as possible, has allied with AutoDesk to re-create the mural in a 360-degree digital environment as a way of returning the mural to the world community. John Weber, founding director of the Institute of Arts and Sciences at UCSC, and Katie Robinson, senior development director for the Institute’s mural initiative, are spearheading the effort. More information is available on the Museo Eduardo Carrillo website or contact Betsey Andersen, executive director of the museum, at spark@cruzio.com. Carrillo was a featured artist in the CSRC’s L.A. Xicano exhibition Art Along the Hyphen: The Mexican-American Generation at the Autry National Center in 2011–12.

 

CSRC on Twitter!

For daily updates on public programs, publications, archive projects, calls for papers, grant information, impact, and more, follow @UCLA_CSRC.

 

 

“Recalling the '93 Day Hall Takeover by Latino Students”

A story on the lecture presented at Cornell University by CSRC director Chon A. Noriega. In the lecture, “‘Cornell on Trial’: The University and the Creative Arts, Revisited,” Noriega reflected on an exhibition he co-curated in 1993 that inadvertently exposed racial tensions on the campus experienced by Latino students and faculty. The subsequent student takeover of Day Hall ultimately resulted in the expansion of the university's Latino Studies Program and the creation of its Latino Living Center.

Cornell Chronicle, October 30, 2014 (PDF)

 

“‘Spine of Califas’ Combines Chicano Music, Poetry at Powell”

A preview of the performance Spine of Califas by members of Taco Shop Poets and Los Illegals, which took place October 24 at Powell Library and was organized by the CSRC.

Daily Bruin, October 23, 2014 (PDF)

 

“‘Cornell on Trial’ Recalls Cause of Day Hall Takeover”

A preview of CSRC director’s Chon A. Noriega’s talk at Cornell University.

Cornell Chronicle, October 20, 2014 (PDF)

 

A Ver series discussed on local radio show

Nancy Katano, executive director of corporate, foundation, and research relations at UCLA, was a guest on The Artist's Way, a KABC radio program hosted by Mark Bryan. She cited the CSRC's A Ver: Revisioning Art History series as an example of a creative project that has succeeded due to innovative thinking and financial planning. Katano's comments on A Ver begin at the 12:35 mark of the hour-long program. The program can be downloaded here.

The Artist's Way, KABC-AM 790, October 19, 2014

 

“Ramon Ramirez’s Newest Works Look at Los Angeles from an Uncharacteristic Vantage Point”

A review of artist Ramon Ramirez's solo exhibition A City to Love, which was on view at Wallspace gallery in Los Angeles in October. The review mentions the “Artist’s Communiqué” in the Fall 2013 issue of Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies, which focuses on Ramirez and can be previewed here.

Life in L.A., October 8, 2014 (PDF)

 

“Hispanics’ ‘Third-Generation U-turn’”

Vilma Ortiz and Edward Telles’s book Generations of Exclusion: Mexican Americans, Assimilation, and Race, which resulted from a major research project conducted at the CSRC, was cited in a story about the “U-turn” of third-generation children of immigrants, a generation that a recent study indicates is losing the economic gains of their parents.

Houston Chronicle, October 8, 2014 (PDF)

 

“You Can Now Buy Quinoa at 7-Eleven—Is That a Good Thing?”

A story on the healthful foods now being offered by 7-Eleven convenience stores and whether they will change customers’ purchase and dietary habits. The story quotes CSRC associate director Alex Ortega.

Takepart, October 2, 2014 (PDF)

 

All ‘In the News’ articles are available in PDF format on the CSRC website.

 

 

B.V. Olguín presents “Towards a Critical Masculinity”

Tuesday, November 4, 2:00–4:00 p.m.

CSRC Library (144 Haines Hall)

The CSRC is pleased to present a poetry reading by B.V. (Ben) Olguín, “Towards a Critical Masculinity? Lyrical Meditations on Gender, Sexuality, and Violence from Houston to Havana.” Olguín is an associate professor of English and creative writing at the University of Texas at San Antonio. His poetry has appeared in Borderlands, Callaloo, and North American Review, and his scholarly publications include La Pinta: Chicana/o Prisoner Literature, Culture, and Politics (University of Texas Press, 2010) and a collection edited with Maggie Rivas Rodriguez, Latina/os and World War II: Mobility, Agency, and Ideology (University of Texas Press, 2014). He is currently working on a manuscript titled “Violentologies: Violence and Ontology in Latina/o Literature, Film, and Popular Culture.” At the CSRC he will read from two new poetry collections: Red Leather Gloves (Hansen Publishing Group, 2014) and At the Risk of Seeming Ridiculous: Poems from Cuba Libre (Aztlan Libre Press, 2014). Both books will be available for purchase at the event. Olguín will also show work from his collaborations with four San Antonio filmmakers (Ray Santisteban, Laura Varela, Jimmy Mendiola, and Efraín Gutiérrez).

 

Jeff Chang presents Who We Be: The Colorization of America

Wednesday, November 5, 4:00 p.m.

Humanities Building, Room A51

UCLA Asian American Studies Center's David and Tina Yamano Nishida Distinguished Lectureship in Asian American Studies presents award-winning author and UCLA alumnus Jeff Chang, who will discuss his new book Who We Be: The Colorization of America (St. Martin’s Press, 2014). In Who We Be, Change explores how the cultural idea of race has evolved over the past fifty years. He draws on the histories of important figures such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Trayvon Martin and investigates a range of commercial and artistic products—such as the posters of Shephard Fairey, the comics of Morrie Turner, and the journalism of José Antonio Vargas—in this comprehensive cultural history. Jeff Chang received his masters in Asian American studies at UCLA and he has written extensively on culture, politics, the arts, and music. He serves as the executive director of the Institute for Diversity in the Arts at Stanford University. Please RSVP at WHOWEBE-AASC.EVENTBRITE.COM. The CSRC is a co-sponsor of this event.

 

Artist’s talk by Consuelo Jimenez Underwood

Thursday, November 6, 3:00–4:30 p.m.

CSRC Library - 144 Haines Hall

The CSRC welcomes fiber artist Consuelo Jimenez Underwood, who will discuss her work in Crossing Borders: Stories of Migration in Contemporary Art, an exhibition at CSU Dominguez Hill’s University Art Gallery. The exhibition, on view through December 4, features six California artists who explore the impact of immigration and migration. Underwood has exhibited and lectured nationally and internationally for more than twenty-five years. Her work is part of the permanent collections of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, and the Mexican Museum of San Francisco, and her contributions to the contemporary Chicano and fiber art movements have been referenced in multiple critical publications. Underwood will bring one of her handmade rebozos to the CSRC event.

 

Poetry Reading and Writing Workshop with Leticia Hernández-Linares

Wednesday, November 12, 12:00 p.m.

UCLA Dodd Hall, Room 161

Leticia Hernández-Linares, the daughter of Salvadoran immigrants, was born in Los Angeles and has been living, writing, and working in San Francisco’s Mission District since 1995. Her work, which crosses genre boundaries and geopolitical borders, merges writing, music, and performance, and incorporates digital media, audience interaction, and costume and props. Hernandez-Linares will perform during a class session of CS 107: “Latina/o Families in the U.S.,” taught by professor Leisy Abrego. Cosponsored by the UCLA César E. Chávez Department of Chicana/Chicano Studies, Union Salvadorena de Estudiantes Universitarios (USEU), and the CSRC.

 

A conversation with KPCC reporter Guzmán-López

RESCHEDULED: Wednesday, November 12, 5:00–7:00 p.m.

UCLA Powell Library, East Rotunda

Rubber bullets coming out of LAPD guns, corrupt politicians yelling profanities, Baby Jesus-Fixers, and a DREAMer who imagines herself a salmon when she is asleep. Adolfo Guzmán-López could not have imagined that these would be the true-life stories that he would cover when he took his first journalism job in 1996. Guzmán-López will talk about these and other stories and how he has avoided the guillotine in the multiplatform journalism revolution (so far). Whether you’re interested in journalism, Southern California history, writing, or Latino issues, his informal talk will inform, engage, and make you laugh. Guzmán-López has been a reporter at NPR-affiliate KPCC 89.3FM since 2000. Sponsored by UCLA Library and cosponsored by the UCLA Career Center, the UCLA Department of English, and the CSRC.

 

Authors present Living the Dream: New Immigration Policies and the Lives of Undocumented Latino Youth

Thursday, November 13, 2:30 p.m.–4:30 p.m. 

CSRC Library - 144 Haines Hall

The CSRC welcomes Maria Chávez, Jessica L. Lavariega Monforti, and Melissa R. Michelson, who will discuss their new book, Living the Dream: New Immigration Policies and the Lives of Undocumented Latino Youth (Paradigm Publishers, 2014). This book is the first to examine the lives of DREAMers following the implementation in 2012 of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, a policy that defers the deportation of college-age undocumented residents. The authors examine how the policy has changed the lives  of more than one hundred Latina/o DREAMers from four states by assessing the life circumstances in which these youth find themselves and documenting the racializing effects that have been generated by the current immigration debate. Paperback copies of the book will be available for purchase at the event.

 

Contributors present Lowriting and ¡Ban This!   

Tuesday, November 18, 2:00–4:00 p.m.

CSRC Library (144 Haines Hall)

The CSRC welcomes nine artists whose work appears in Lowriting: Shots, Rides, and Stories from the Chicano Soul, featuring the photography by Art Meza (Broken Sword Publications, 2014), and ¡Ban This! The BSP Anthology of Xican@ Literature (Broken Sword Publications, 2012), both edited by Santino J. Rivera. These writers and photographers will talk about their contributions to the anthologies and share stories about the cars, music, and events that have shaped Chicana/o history in Los Angeles and beyond. Both books will be available for purchase.

 

IAC Fall Forum and Reception

Tuesday, November 18, 4:30 p.m.–7:00 p.m.

UCLA Faculty Center, California Room

Join the Institute of American Cultures in honoring the 2014–15 IAC visiting researchers and scholars, graduate and predoctoral fellows, and research grant awardees for all four UCLA ethnic studies centers. Researchers and scholars will present their research projects and entertain questions from the audience. For more information and to RSVP, click here.

 

All CSRC events are free unless otherwise noted. Programs are subject to change. For the most current information, visit the Events page on the CSRC website.

 

 

Guerrero exhibition continues

The library exhibition That's Entertainment: Dan Guerrero and the Making of a Hollywood Original centers on the life of a man Hispanic magazine named “one of the twenty-five most powerful Latinos in Hollywood.” Son of the legendary musician Lalo Guerrero, Dan Guerrero is an award-winning television and live event producer, a Broadway talent agent, a Latino and LGBTQ activist, and a writer and performer. The exhibition includes documentary images of Guerrero’s youth in East Los Angeles, his years in the New York theater, his return to Los Angeles as a Hollywood producer, and his work as an outspoken activist for the Latino and LGBTQ communities. His lifelong friendship with Carlos Almaraz, the late celebrated Chicano visual artist, is also represented. The materials for this exhibition are taken from the Dan Guerrero Research Collection at the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center and the California Ethnic and Multicultural Archives (CEMA) in the UCSB Library’s Department of Special Collections. The exhibition is on view through December 19 and is open to the public during regular library hours, Monday–Friday, 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

 

To learn more about CSRC collections and projects please email your queries to the CSRC librarian, Lizette Guerra, at lguerra@chicano.ucla.edu.

 

 

Call for Submissions—Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies

Aztlán, the premier journal of Chicana/o studies, is inviting new submissions!  Aztlán publishes scholarship from many disciplines relevant to Chicana/o studies, and welcomes submissions in both English and Spanish. We are seeking submissions for all three areas of the journal:

 

Essays

Our essays come form a wide variety of disciplines-literature, sociology, history, political science, the arts, linguistics, gender studies, ethnic studies, and many other fields - but always engage the Chicano experience. All essays are peer reviewed and frequently revised to meet the journal's standards for quality research. Essays typically run about 10,000-12,000 words in length.

 

Dossiers

Our dossiers are about half the length of the essays and are less academically rigorous. Generally our dossiers cohere around a specific subject or theme.  Aztlán Journal will consider working with a scholar as a guest curator who wishes to create a dossier theme for an issue and helps to manage dossier development. Please contact Karrmen Crey at kcrey@chicano.ucla.edu to explore this opportunity.

 

Book Reviews

If you are interested in writing a book review for us, we gladly consider suggested titles-or we can recommend a book for you that matches your field of interest. Please be sure to contact our book review coordinator, Daniel Zweifach directly at revieweditor@chicano.ucla.edu to inquire about reviews.

 

To submit: All submissions should be sent to our submission inbox at submissions@chicano.ucla.edu. For complete information about Aztlán and our submission guidelines, please visit the CSRC website. Please direct queries to Karrmen Crey, assistant editor, at kcrey@chicano.ucla.edu. We look forward to your submissions!

 

 

IAC Visiting Researcher/Scholar and Graduate/Predoctoral Fellowships for 2015-16

The Institute of American Cultures (IAC) makes funds available annually through its Visiting Researcher/Scholar and fellowship programs. These awards have resulted in the publication of hundreds of books, monographs, and articles as well as the completion of many dissertations, master’s theses, and MFA film projects. They have contributed significantly to the fund of new knowledge about America’s underrepresented populations.

 

IAC Visiting Researcher/Scholar and Graduate/Predoctoral Fellowships are competitive awards that support scholarships on African Americans, American Indian, Asian Americans, and Chicanas/os. The acceptance of a fellowship carries with it a commitment to contribute to the research activities of the sponsoring ethnic studies research center and, in some cases, to teach a ten-week seminar based on the fellow’s research.

 

The online applications are now available. Applications are due February 2, 2015.

 

For more information including a link to the applications, visit the following pages on the IAC site:

 

Visiting Researcher and Visiting Scholar Program in Ethnic Studies: http://www.iac.ucla.edu/fellowships_visitingscholar.html

 

Graduate and Predoctoral Fellowship in Ethnic Studies: http://www.iac.ucla.edu/fellowships_graduate.html

 

 

Image: Tino Rodríguez, Tlaloc’s Paradise, 2002. Oil on wooden panel, 12 x 12 inches. © 2002 by Tino Rodríguez; reproduced by permission of the artist.