Teaching & Community Engagement
My work as an educator is closely linked to my practice as a curator: both require creative vision, problem-solving, improvisation, and translation of complex ideas for broad audiences.
I’ve taught a wide range of diverse students in the US and abroad, including K-12, college and university students, as well as adult immigrant and international students. I’m grounded in student-centered, participatory, and experiential approaches to learning, teaching and educational justice, shaped by the work of Paulo Freire and bell hooks.
Artwork and photograph by Zhidong Zhang, 2024.
FALL 2023: CRITICAL ISSUES IN CONTEMPORARY ART @ RISD
I designed and taught a graduate course at the Rhode Island School of Design for 5 MFA students, engaging critical theoretical issues and practice-based questions in the field of contemporary art. Organized around the 5 senses, the course engaged each sense as a starting point to jump into a selection and discussion of artists’ work and practices. We also carried out a hands-on field trip to Boston for a guided tour of MIT’s Materials Research Lab.
Artwork by Favianna Rodriguez, 2017.
Spring 2021: LANGUAGE, POWER, AnD LEARNING @ UCSB
FALL 2020: LANGUAGE & POWER @ UCSB
From September 2020 through June 2021, I taught two courses at the University of California Santa Barbara as a lecturer across the Linguistics and Chicana/o Studies Departments. Each course enrolled between 250-300 students and was hosted via Zoom due to the pandemic. This experience challenged me to find new approaches and ways of creating community within our virtual classroom.
TEACHING SHOUT-OUTS
I’m grateful to have learned from many amazing educators throughout my own life: Mary Bucholtz, Inés Casillas, Rick Benjamin, Kum-Kum Bhavnani, Laura Demaria, and Manel Lacorte, as well as artists April Bojorquez and Matt Garcia of desertArtLAB, Tanya Aguiñiga, and the work of Lorraine O’Grady, Lynda Barry, and Corita Kent.
OTHER COURSES I’VE TAUGHT
Language and Society (Linguistics 70; Anthropology 104)
Language, Gender, and Sexuality (Linguistics 132)
Poetry in the Community (Comparative Literature 186P)
Literatures of Social Justice (Comparative Literature 186L)
Wild Literature (Comparative Literature 186W)
African American Language and Culture (Linguistics 136)
Introduction to Linguistics (Linguistics 20)
Linguistics and Life (Linguistics 15)
English as a Second Language (K-12+)
Spanish 1 & Spanish 2