Fall 2020 M.A. Cohort

FALL 2020 MA COHORT Paula Benavides (she/her/hers) was born in Colombia and raised in Houston, TX. She received her BA from UT Austin where she majored in Anthropology and minored in Latin American Studies. Her honor’s thesis explored auto-ethnographic work in vignette form. Her work focused on the time she spent in Cartagena, Colombia and therefore was heavily influenced and informed by Afro-Colombian theorists, scholars, and activists. Since graduating, Paula has worked as a crisis case manager for the anti-trafficking department at the Refugee Services of Texas where she provided wrap-around social services to foreign born and domestic clients of any age and all genders. Paula is excited to take what she’s learned as a social worker and continue to work within the Austin community. Her current research interests are centered around prison abolition and it’s intersection with queer liberation. Paula would like to explore this with particular attention to how transformative justice is an anti-racist, anti-homophobic endeavor that must be trans and gender non-conforming centered and led. She is particularly interested in the ways that queer and trans abolitionists and prison activists work outside of the limitations of the non-profit industrial complex. Paula also loves to read, go on picnics, and do a lil paintin’.

Mataia Blackwell (she/her/hers) was born and raised in Ada, Oklahoma and obtained her Bachelors of Arts in Human Relations from The University of Oklahoma. As an undergraduate she was the Vice-President of the Student Society of Human Relations and was a member of the Ronald E. McNair Post baccalaureate Achievement Program. During her time as a McNair Scholar her research focused on Black women’s maternal health and social media. Additionally, she was an intern who worked her way up to becoming a staff member with Oklahoma’s sole statewide LGBTQ+ advocacy organization, Freedom Oklahoma. Mataia is incredibly passionate about social justice issues and fighting oppressive systems and loves to mix these passions with her academic work. Her research interests include intersectionality in the LGBTQ+ community, social media, Black feminism, and race theory. Outside of work and academia she enjoys watching movies, journaling and astrology.

Gabryella Desporte (they/them/theirs) is a nonbinary creative with a penchant for technology, digital inclusion, and digital accessibility. They received their B.A. in Latin American Studies from the University of Texas in Austin in 2017, and since then, had been working at Latinitas as a Program Coordinator, a nonprofit organization that seeks to empower all girls to innovate through media and technology. While at Latinitas, they served as a Digital Inclusion Fellow through NTEN (the Nonprofit Technology Education Network)’s DI Fellowship, where they served over 300 Spanish-speaking parents to learn basic computer literacy skills, and assisted in giving families access to technology to bridge the digital divide. Desporte’s research interests include surveillance technology/biometrics, feminist theory concerning transgender livelihood, USA and South America borders, human augmentation/”biohacking”, cybersecurity, ethics in technology/ computer science ethics, migration, and digital citizenship. Through this program, they hope to scratch the surface to better understand the connections between transgender people and their spatial relationship to technology, undoing oppressive digital practices in physical spaces, and to better understand the relationships between digital presence and modes of oppression through intersectional theory. In their free time, they like to create art, go out to shows, program Raspberry Pi projects, and read.

Magdalena Isabel Garcia, or Izzy (she/they) grew up in the eclectic town of Kankakee, IL. As a child in a mixed status family, in a town with a large underserved immigrant community, she recognized injustice and inaccessibility before she had the language for it. Understanding education as a mechanism to fight back, she pursued her academic endeavors with fervor. She graduated from the University of Illinois at Chicago studying women, gender, and social justice. Through UIC she was able to connect with the southwest community of Chicago serving as an ESL instructor for parents in Gage Park and Brighton Park. She spent time volunteering at Teen Reach, an after school program where she tutored creative and kind students of all ages. Through tutoring she learned about the experiences of young people in her community. Magdalena is also a writer, storyteller, and performer. Experiences as an educator, volunteer, community member, and artist fortified her interests in the school-prison pipeline, trauma, girls of color, immigration, abolition, and storytelling. In her pursuit of grad school, she hopes to continue to hold herself accountable to the communities she comes from and serves, and to honor every woman and every youth she has had the opportunity to share space with.

Jessica Olson (she/her/hers) describes herself as a queer climate feminist. Born in California and growing into her feminism in Central Texas, she graduated from Southwestern University in 2014 with a Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Studies and Feminist Studies as a Paideia Scholar. In 2014, she published her research interrogating the gender dynamics of the UN climate talks in Agenda, a South African feminist journal, and in 2018, she published a pioneering report with UN Women that explores the connections between climate change, gender, and human mobility. Pursuing a dual Master of Public Affairs (MPAff) and Master of Arts in Women and Gender Studies (MA), Jessica’s graduate research will identify the many intersections of economic, social, and political structures that create and uphold systemic inequality and oppression in relation to climate change. She is specifically interested in areas where gaps in data are present, such as the impacts of climate disasters felt by queer and disabled people and communities. In her professional life, she is the Senior Climate Lead for the Sierra Club’s Gender Equity and Environment Program, driving the program’s work on issues of climate change, working toward justice-centered human movements, and fostering young feminist climate action.

Patricia Romero (she/her/hers) was born and raised in San Francisco, CA but has lived in the Pacific Northwest for the last decade. She earned a B.A. in Women’s Studies from Portland State University. Her interest in pop culture developed into something more when she realized that consuming media with a feminist lens was a valid excuse to watch more television. She loves pop culture and loves to analyze it even more. Her research interests include the construction of race, gender and class on television. While at the University of Texas in Austin, she would like to look into how Latinx bodies, languages, and nationalities are viewed through a one-dimensional lens. Patricia has been with Bitch Media since 2015 and is currently the Community Programs Manager. She is the primary coordinator for Bitch on Campus and Writing Fellowships program. When she is not working you can find her singing karaoke and dancing with friends.

SUPPORT OUR PROGRAMS Your gifts to the Center for Women’s & Gender Studies help create committed communities that address the challenges faced in the areas of gender, sexuality, diversity, and equity. Gifts designated to the Center for Women’s & Gender Studies help preserve and enhance programming, course development, endowments and support outreach initiatives.

Mail: Center for Women’s & Gender Studies The University of Texas at Austin 2505 University Ave, Stop 4900 Burdine Hall, Suite 536 Austin, TX 78712

Please make checks payable to The University of Texas at Austin and indicate in the memo line that you are supporting the Center for Women’s & Gender Studies.

Give Online: Go to UT Austin’s secure website and click on the “Donate here” link. Visit: http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/cwgs/giving Thank you for your contribution and support.

Contact us

Center for Women’s & Gender Studies The University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts 2505 University Avenue, Stop A4900 BUR 536 Austin, TX 78712 (512) 471-5765 cwgs@austin.utexas.edu http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/cwgs https://www.facebook. com/utcwgs

https://twitter.com/ utcwgs

https://www.youtube. com/user/utcwgs

https://www.instagram.com/utcwgs/

https://www. linkedin.com/ groups/12055898/