Latina Outsiders Remaking Latina Identity

Latina Outsiders Remaking Latina Identity is an exploration of Latinas on the periphery of both Latina culture and mainstream culture in the United States. Whether they are deliberately rejected or whether they choose to reject sexist, classist, or racist practices within their cultures, the subjects of these articles, essays, short fiction, poems, testimonios, and visual art demonstrate the value of their experience. Ultimately, the outsider experience influences what the larger culture adopts, demonstrating that a different perspective is key to remaking Latina identity. Outside perspectives include those of queer, indigenous, Afro-Latina, activist, and differently-abled individuals. By challenging stereotypes and revealing the diverse range of narrativesthat make up the Latina experience, Latina Outsiders Remaking Latina Identity will expand and deepen notions of the Latina identity for students and researchers of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies.

I. Ideology and Class 1. Punks and Hipsters: Latina Outsiders Remaking Latina Identity 2. "The child is bewitched": Syncretism and Self-Making in Cristina García's Dreaming in Cuban 3. Coritos for Las de Afuera 4. The Journey of a Sexy Nerd—Antes Muerte Que Sencilla 5. Just for Standing Out 6. Activism is Not a Phase: Testimonio of a Radical Xicana PhD 7. Playing Chola: The Discourse of Subjects and Subject-Selves 8. Caravan 9. Ruidosas to the Front: Alice Bag and the Construction of Violence Girl II. Gender/Sexuality 10. Loving Latinas: When Questioning Sexuality Means Questioning Latinidad 11. Returning to the Bronx: Gender; the Outsider Perspective, amdUtopiain Juliet Takes a Breath 12. Separación 13. Catcalls to My Brain 14. Between and Beyond the Mediated and the Material in Teatro Luna’s Generation Sex 15. Permission 16. Excerpt from Ch. 6 of The Lunasole Class 17. Parts of an Autobiography 18. Every woman keeps a flame against the wind III. Race/Ethnicity 19. Dear Barbara T. y Gloria E.: Found Autoethnographic Letters toBlacktina nepantla Acrobats 20. Haciendo Caras: The Alter-Native Illuminations of Laura Varela and Vaago Weiland’s Enlight-Tent 21. Living On the Threshold: A Latina English Professor 22. My English Victorian Dating Troubles 23. What was the passion fruit named before the Europeans renamed it? 24. Inlaws, Outlaws 25. Yo Soy Boricua Feminista, Pa’que Tu Lo Sepas!: Notes from a Diasporican on Performing Outsider Identity IV. Disability 26. Latina Liberation: A Conversation of Soul, Sacred Well-Beingand Community 27. Pa’Que Sepan 28. The Symbology of the Derailed Mind 29. Poison and Monsters 30. Stroke 31. You Either See Me or You Don’t, V. Loneliness, Solitude, and the Unspeakable 32. My Mother as the Voice of Frida Kahlo 33. Sounding La Raza Cósmica 34.Why a Girl Becomes a Hardcore Chica 35. Dropping Dimes 36. Good Enough 37. Tracing Elaine Summer’s Dance and Performance Lineage: Performance Notes 38. Belonging, Chaos, Blood, and Tissues: Assumptions about Latina Writers in Academia 39. Write Like a Girl 40. Conclusion

Grisel Y. Acosta is an associate professor at the City University of New York—Bronx Community College, and teaches Latinx literature and creative writing. Her work is in the American Studies Journal, African American Women’s Language, The Routledge Companion to Latino/a Literature (2013), and VIDA: Women in Literary Arts.