Professor, Anthropologist, Playwright, Dancer

Hortense Gerardo '78, PhD, Brings Multidisciplinary Approach To Academic Career

By Maggie Mroz Lamb ’84 , Director of Development

From her Magnificat days as a student leader and class salutatorian to becoming the founder and director of University of California San Diego’s innovative Anthropology, Performance, and Technology Program— the first of its kind in the nation—Hortense Gerardo ’78, PhD’s pursuits have been driven by unquenchable curiosity, creative expression, and research interests.

“I was expected to follow in my parents’ footsteps and practice medicine,” Gerardo recalled.

She initially pursued biology at Boston University before her path took several unexpected turns—including traveling to Africa to study African drumming as a form of communication for her master’s degree. After earning her PhD in anthropology and performing arts at Boston University, Gerardo completed postdoctoral work at Yale. There she discovered “the joys of scientific research” in cognitive neuroscience, igniting a passion that would lead her far beyond traditional laboratory settings. Her studies and research interests helped her to build a career exploring human experience through multiple lenses—as professor, playwright, screenwriter, and dancer.

Her first professional role was surprisingly not in medicine or research, but as a scriptwriter for Hanna-Barbera in Sydney, Australia. The position, which required scientific expertise to create first aid instruction for children, became what she calls “the perfect apprenticeship for a screenwriter and playwright.”

Gerardo credits much of her intellectual confidence to her all-girls education at Magnificat. She references psychologist Carol Gilligan’s observation that many girls experience “a sharp and particular clarity of vision” around age 11 that often disappears by their mid-teens.

“Attending an all-girl school helped to attenuate the strictures and demands imposed by cultural expectation,” she explained.

Among her formative influences, Gerardo highlights Sister Mary Therese Berry, HM, who “conveyed a sense of fashion and worldliness despite wearing a nun’s habit—a great model of resistance!” Sister Berry organized Gerardo’s first trip to Paris and first airplane ride, experiences that expanded her horizons beyond the classroom.

Today, as constantly emerging technologies reshape human storytelling and interaction, Gerardo’s work explores “new forms of narrative storytelling using augmented reality, virtual reality, new media, and machine learning.” Her adaptation to evolving tools reflects her lifelong approach to knowledge—treating serious academic inquiry as “a highly disciplined form of play.” Her writing, films, and plays have been performed and critically acclaimed nationally and internationally, including an award from the Concord Festival of Screenplays in Massachusetts, an honor of which she is especially proud.

When asked about her greatest achievement, Gerardo’s answer has nothing to do with academic accolades or creative projects.

“I am most proud of my son Roland, who is a multidisciplinary designer and creative,” she said. “He also happens to be a socially-minded and kind person.”

Looking back on her own student days, she adds wisdom earned through experience: “I would trust my instincts more and perhaps not be so hard on myself. As trite as it sounds, life is short. Enjoy.”

To learn more about her work, visit www.hortensegerardo.com

Alumna Advice: Hortense Gerardo ’78, PhD “Be honest with yourself about what your true passion is, and then pursue it with dedication, rigor, and a sense of play.”

1 Gilligan, Carol; Lyons, Nona P.; Hanmer, Trudy J.; Emma Willard School (Troy, N. Y. ) (1990). Making connections : the relational worlds of adolescent girls at Emma Willard School. Internet Archive. Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press. ISBN 0674540417