abstract: My dissertation topic engages in the trajectory of Roma/Gitano culture and flamenco and its implications for Chicanx culture in New Mexico. New Mexicans have the reputation amongst US Chicanx as referring to themselves as Hispanic and aligning culturally with a Spanish sensibility. Historically in the larger US Chicanx community this type of popularity for flamenco would be described as typical of New Mexico’s wavering Chicanidad that yearns to be connected to a Spanish colonial past more than to its indigenous Mexican roots. However, I believe the reality is a bit different. What makes New Mexican Chicanx different from the larger US Chicanx community is that they utilize flamenco and its Gitano roots as a cultural example of their Chicanidad. There is scant research on how Chicanidad as a historical movement has been influenced by the flamenco culture that exists in New Mexico. This dissertation will begin a conversation that places flamenco and the precarious identity of Chicanx, Gitanos and Nuevomejicanos in dialogue through the body, the art form, and the cultural stylings of flamenco rooted in the Flamenco Festival Internacional de Albuquerque (FFI). / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Theatre 2019

This multi-modal dissertation examines the historical hegemonic making of U.S. education, and how compulsory schooling has framed acceptable notions of culture, language/literacy, and knowledge production. Through this criticism of colonization and education, theoretical and practical alternatives are explored for the opportunities outside mainstream schooling in the US. In examining the literary work on decolonizing education, these efforts can engage in unlearning of coloniality by finding examples from a time before colonization. In contemporary society, the practice of de/unschooling can hold the possibilities for decolonizing education. To demonstrate how families of color in the U.S. engage with unschooling, interview questions serve as the sharing of knowledge and experience so as to ground the research in lived reality. A brief survey of critical education and critical pedagogy broadens those already critical of schools and/or receptive to the criticism of schools and the un/deschooling alternative then places student and family/community as the center of learning and teaching.

Representations of Chicana bodies in dominant popular culture have historically been contested by Chicana feminists’ own self-representations through art and literature. However, few works examine representations of fat Chicana bodies in literature by Chicana feminists. Through a literary analysis of The Panza Monologues and Real Women Have Curves, as well as an artistic analysis of Laura Aguilar’s photography and through the lenses of Chicanx, queer, and fat studies, my research bridges a gap between Chicana feminist work and fat studies. It looks at how fatness is constructed through the self-representation of women’s bodies. Ultimately, I argue that these art objects are sites of fat Chicana artivism—activism through the use of art—that call for body liberation, respond to the “normative body” required by a colonial legacy of symbolic and physical violence against Chicanx women, and pave the way for further creative artistic and literary work centered on fat Chicanxs to be done.

Being one of the largest and most influential ethnic groups in Southern California, Mexican and Latinx communities have continuously played a significant role in the shaping of major cities. Despite the history of racist and exclusionary urban planning and policy, Latinxs have persevered through adaptive and creative methods of creating space and reusing resources. Such strength, creativity, and resourcefulness are assets within Latinx communities and are also ways that they practice sustainability, thus having the potential to play a significant role in the development of sustainable cities. Therefore, by focusing local solutions and development projects on community assets as opposed to just community need, voice, autonomy, and inclusion are given to Latinx communities, where they not only participate in the development projects that affect them but are the drivers of the solutions and positive changes they see in their communities. I will be doing two case studies on two non-profit community-based organizations, Huerta del Valle and East LA Community Corporation, who practice this form of asset-based community development. Being situated in two of the most population dense areas in Southern California with the highest concentrations of Mexican and Latinx people, East Los Angeles and the Inland Empire, both organizations serve predominantly Mexican and Latinx communities. By practicing asset-based community development through their programming, Huerta del Valle and East LA Community Corporation are connecting their local communities to decision-making spaces, socially and economically empowering their communities, and overseeing green communal urban spaces. Thus, through asset-based community development, these two organizations are able to uplift and meet the needs of both human ecosystems and the natural ecosystems, creating socially, economically, and environmentally sustainable cities, especially for historically marginalized urban communities.