Dr. Michelle Téllez, author of Border Women and the Community of Maclovio Rojas, Autonomy in the Spaces of Neoliberal Neglect, will give a talk at 7 p.m. September 26, 2022 in Schroeder Hall, room 238 on the campus of Illinois State University.
The talk is free and open to the public. Téllez’s visit is part of the celebration of Latinx Heritage Month, which runs from September 15-October 15, 2022, and is sponsored by Illinois State’s Latin American and Latino/a Studies (LALS) program, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Stevenson Center for Community and Economic Development and the Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies program.
“We are delighted to open Latinx Heritage Month welcoming to campus Dr. Michelle Tellez, educator and scholar of border communities, in particular women’s border activism,” said Dr. Maura Toro-Morn, director of LALS. “This year the U.S./Mexico border frames many of the lectures, events, and conversations to take place throughout the more than one-month long events.”
Find more Latinx Month Heritage events.
Those with questions about the event can contact Lourdes Concepción Cabán at ldconce@ilstu.edu and Toro-Morn at mitmorn@ilstu.edu.
Michelle Téllez biography:
Téllez is an associate professor of and director of the Graduate Studies program at the University of Arizona. She is a mother to a 15-year-old daughter, scholar, and activist who has been committed to advancing projects of social justice, resistance, and exploring the human experience for the last 25 years.
She writes about gendered migration, Chicana mothering, transnational community formations, and autonomy. In the 1990s she was introduced to these modalities by the student movement for the Chicanx Studies known as the Zapatistas and by her involvement with Incite! Woman of Color Against Violence, a network of radical feminists of color organizing to end state, home, and community violence.
Téllez has been involved in many grassroots projects that use critical pedagogy, principles of sustainability and community-based arts, performance, and visual media to work towards radical transformation in communities. Téllez is also the founding member of the Chicana M(other) Work Collective, the Binational Artist in Residency project, and is on the editorial review board for Chicana/Latina Studies: The Journal of Mujeres Activas en Letras y Cambio Social and Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies.
Published in several book anthologies, Téllez’s work can be found in journals such as Gender and Society, Feminist Formations, Aztlán, and Chicana/ Latina Studies. She has also published works in online outlets such as The Feminist Wire, Truth Out, and Latino Rebels. Her two books are The Chicana M(other) work Anthology (2019) which is co-edited and Border Women and the Community of Maclovio Rojas: Autonomy in the Spaces of Neoliberal Neglect (2021), which is taught in classes across Illinois State’s campus in the Department of Sociology; Latin American and Latino/a Studies; and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
