Label Me Latina/o Spring 2017 Volume 7
Filed under: spring
Essays
By Elena Avilés
Elena Avilés is an Assistant Professor of Chicano/Latino Studies in the School of Gender, Race and Nations at Portland State University. She received her doctorate from the University of New Mexico in Hispanic Languages and Literatures. Her teaching and research are informed by the fields of feminism, gender, and ethnic studies as well as by the literary and visual arts. Her teaching interests cover topics related to Chicano/Latino literature and Chicana feminist politics as they relate to the humanities. She uses the humanities as praxis to engage in transnational/global dialogues and exchanges with the histories and cultures of U.S. women of color.
By Victoria Lucia Cabrera-Polk
Victoria Cabrera-Polk received her MA in literature from the University of Central Florida. She currently teaches composition and literature at the University of Central Florida. Her research interests include Latino/Latina literature, narratives of the marginalized voice, identity politics and feminist and postcolonial theory.
Poetry
By Carlos Odria
Carlos Odria (Ph.D. Musicology) is a Peruvian-born musician, writer, and musicologist. He writes for Miami-based cultural magazine Suburbano and teaches at the University of Massachussets Boston’s Performing Arts Department. His poetry has appeared in The Acentos Review. He has published, or have forthcoming articles and chapters, in Ethnomusicology, Mundos Interiores, and the Oxford Handbook of Sonic Repatriation. Currently, he is composing and producing original music for The River, a documentary film that will be presented at the ASLE-2017 Biennial Conference in Detroit. (www.carlosodria.com)
By Elizabeth Jiménez Montelongo
Elizabeth Jiménez Montelongo is a visual artist and poet based in the San Francisco Bay area. Her poem Footless Dancers was published in the first volume of the bilingual anthology Nos pasamos de la raya/We Crossed the Line and her two poems We Will Continue and Crooked Line will be published in the second volume. Like her poetry, Elizabeth’s visual artwork carries the themes of identity, self-transformation, and empowerment. Her artwork is thematically and visually inspired by the culture of her Anahuak (Mesoamerican) and American Indian ancestors. She has exhibited her artwork in California, Washington, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Colorado. In 2010, Elizabeth earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Pictorial Arts with a concentration in Painting and Drawing as well as a Bachelor of Arts in French from San José State University. She currently manages Roots Artist Registry, a directory of visual, performing and literary artists.
By Margarita Dager-Uscocovich
Margarita Dager-Uscocovich was born in Guayaquil Ecuador in 1967. She has written since she was ten years old beginning with small pieces in student newspapers, and then as editor of the school newspaper at Urdesa High School in 1986. Living in numerous countries both in Europe and the Americas combined with her different maternal and paternal heritages has provided her with a broad perspective that allows her to communicate her emotions. Margarita has never published professionally but she has contributed editorials to Mundo Latino, a local Charlotte newspaper. Her poetry has been included in previous ARTE LATINO NOW exhibitions as well as in the El Quijote Festival. She has been a finalist in several international literary competitions including I Certamen de Poesía de Valores Humanos and I Certamen de Poesía Mujeres Extraordinarias sponsored by Letras Como Espada (Toledo-España); I Certamen de Poesía Lluvia de Letras, I Certamen de Micro Relato de Terror y Fantasía sponsored by Ediciones de Letras and the VII Certamen de Literatura (Buenos Aires –Argentina) 2016. She loves all forms art… theater, dance, expressionism, realism, narrative…
Short Story
Arizona Sheriff in Love, a Short Story
By Guillermo Reyes
Guillermo Reyes has produced and published a variety of plays including the comedies, Men on the Verge of a His-Panic Breakdown and Mother Lolita as off-Broadway productions with Urban Stages, Chilean Holiday and Saints at the Rave at the Humana Festival at Actors Theatre of Louisville. In 2010, he published a memoir with the University of Wisconsin Press, entitled Madre and I: A Memoir of our Immigrant Lives, chronicling his immigration from Chile and growing up in the D.C. area and in Hollywood, CA. He is a professor at Arizona State University in the School of Film, Dance and Theater. In 2014, his sketch comedy play, The Hispanick Zone, was published by L&S Books and is available on Amazon.com, and his docudrama about the Gabby Giffords shooting and Giffords’ relationship with her intern, Daniel Hernández, was dramatized in That Day in Tucson, which debuted at Borderlands Theater in Tucson, and will be published in a new anthology by Dramatic Publishing, Palabras del Cielo: An Exploration of Latino Theater for Young Audiences. He has also written short stories which have appeared in The New Mexico Humanities Review, Puerto del Sol, The Americas Review, Label Me Latina/o, the anthologies From Macho to Mariposa, Americas Review: 25 Year Anniversary Edition, Besame Mucho and others.
By Isaac Chavarría
Isaac Chavarría is a pocho with an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Texas-Pan American. He enjoys assisting non-profit organizations in producing chapbooks for workshop participants. His poems are in The Acentos Review, BorderSenses, and Rio Grande Review online. His poetry book, Poxo, from Slough Press, received the inaugural 2014 NACCS-Tejas Poetry Award. You can find Isaac in Alton, TX.
By Roberto G. Fernandez
Cuban-American writer. Among his works are: Raining Backwards, Holy Radishes! En la ocho y la doce, Entre dos aguas, El príncipe y la bella cubana.
By Fabian Balmori
Fabián Balmori, born in A Coruña, Spain, completed a Ph.D. in Spanish from Florida State University, with emphasis in XIX and XX Century Latin American Poetry. Fabián has publications in literary criticism as well as in creative writing. Currently, he is an Associate Professor of Spanish and Hispanic Studies Program Director at Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama.
By Eneida Patricia Alcalde González
Eneida Patricia Alcalde González is a Chilean-born Latina with Puerto Rican roots passionate about exploring the complex history and rich cultures of Latinx Americans through her stories, often centered on Latin American mythology as well as contemporary issues. In her career, she has been a nonprofit executive and consultant based in Washington, DC—writing and winning millions in grant awards for reputable organizations such as Edu-Futuro, CentroNía, and the César Chávez Public Charter Schools. She is also a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer who served in Bolivia, the heart of Latin America. Eneida holds dual bachelor’s degrees from Penn State and is a student at Harvard University’s Extension School through which she seeks to obtain a Master’s in Literature and Creative Writing. In 2017, her fiction is also scheduled to appear in outlets such as The Potomac Journal and Stoneboat Literary Journal.
Creative Non-Fiction
By Antonio Tovar
Antonio Tovar was born in Texas but raised in Mexico City. He’s a self-taught painter, writer and photographer. His work as painter and photographer has been shown in more than 30 solo exhibitions and over 100 collective shows in the US, Europe and Mexico. In 2015, he received a grant from The Gottlieb Foundation, based on his trajectory spanning over 20 years as a professional painter and photographer. Also in 2015, his painting project entitled “Art as Universal Language” was a finalist in the prestigious fellowship granted by The Guggenhein Foundation. He was invited to participate as a special guest with his photography project “Pictografias” at the Festival Internacional de Cultura Mazatlán 2015 in Mazatlán, Sinaloa, Mexico. The same photographic project was exhibited in 2016 at the prestigious Galería Ramón Alva de la Canal, which belongs to La Universidad Veracruzana, in Xalapa, Veracruz, México. “Pictografias” has also been in an itinerant exhibition in the State of Veracruz at several cultural centers and campuses of this prestigious university. He was invited to participate in an international juried exhibition entitled “Statement,” at the CICA Museum in South Korea. In 2016, he curated a collective show entitled “Arte +Arte” in San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, Mexico. The same show will be exhibited in April 2017 at La Casa del Lago Cultural Center in Xalapa, Veracruz. His body of work in painting and photography is found in several private and public collections, among them the Ludwig Museum of Photography in Cologne, Germany, the Mexican Museum in San Francisco, California, Kaiser Permanente Research Center in San Francisco as well as the Goethe Institute San Francisco. He was the founder and art director of the gallery Los Santos Inocentes in San Francisco and co-founder and art director of Galería El Sur in Granada, Spain as well as co-founder and art director of La Casa del Libro, a bookstore and art gallery in San Francisco. As a writer, his work has been published in several journals and magazines including El Replicante and Label Me Latino. Currently he lives in Mexico and New York City.
Theater
By Teresa Dovalpage
Teresa Dovalpage was born in Havana and now lives in Taos, New Mexico. She currently teaches at UNM Taos and writes for Taos News, Hispanic Executive and other publications. A bilingual author, she has published eight novels, six in Spanish and two in English, two collections of short stories in Spanish and one in English. She has also written two theater plays. Her English-language novels are A Girl like Che Guevara (Soho Press, 2004) and Habanera, a Portrait of a Cuban Family (Floricanto Press, 2010). Her collection of short stories The Astral Plane, Stories of Cuba, the Southwest and Beyond was published by the University of New Orleans Press in 2012. In her native Spanish she has authored the novels Muerte de un murciano en La Habana (Death of a Murcian in Havana, Anagrama, 2006, a runner-up for the Herralde Award in Spain), El difunto Fidel (The late Fidel, Renacimiento, 2011, that won the Rincon de la Victoria Award in Spain in 2009), Posesas de La Habana (Haunted ladies of Havana, PurePlay Press, 2004), La Regenta en La Habana (Edebe Group, Spain, 2012,) Orfeo en el Caribe (Atmósfera Literaria, Spain, 2013) and El retorno de la expatriada (The expat’s return, Egales, Spain, 2014).
The Gentry: Ten Minutes for Alex Nieto
By Mónica Sánchez
Mónica Sánchez has followed her bliss, towards a life in the theatre and the theatre of life. She has honed the craft of professional actor, written and developed work collaboratively and independently for the stage, directed a handful of productions small and large, and enjoyed a myriad of assignments as a teaching artist and community engagement facilitator. After 20+ years in San Francisco and Los Angeles, working with and learning from inspired and inspiring contemporary theatre artists, the prodigal daughter has returned to her native New Mexico and is currently completing an MFA in Dramatic Writing at the University of New Mexico.
Interview
Project ñ and Latinidad in the Digital Age: A Conversation with Latina Filmmaker Denise Soler Cox*
By Megan Myers
Megan Jeanette Myers is an Assistant Professor of Spanish and affiliate faculty in Latino/a Studies at Iowa State University. Myers specializes in Hispanophone Caribbean literature and is currently working on a book manuscript that considers how alternate representations of Haiti in Dominican and Dominican American literature relate to Hispaniola’s history of metaphorical and physical border politics. Myers has recently published in the Afro-Hispanic Review, Caribe, and Confluencia.
*Interview conducted in-person in Ames, IA on October 13, 2016. Interview was transcribed from an original recording.
