LALS SPOTLIGHT Dr. Yoalli Rodríguez Aguilera

LALS SPOTLIGHT Dr. Yoalli Rodríguez Aguilera

Interview Conducted by Josué Paniagua

Yoalli Rodriguez Aguilera (Ph.D., UT Austin) is an Assistant Professor of Latin American and Latino Studies. They specialize in environmental racism, ecological grief, mestizaje, state violence, and anti/ de-colonial feminism in Latin America, with their work intersecting between race, gender, environment, and affect. They were awarded the 2021 National Women Studies Association and University of Illinois Press (NWSA/UIP) First Book Prize. Their book manuscript (University of Illinois Press) is tentatively titled Grieving Geographies, Mourning Waters: Race, Gender, and Environment on the Coast of Oaxaca, Mexico.

It’s so great to have you join the DePaul community! Could you tell me a little about yourself?

My name is Yoalli Rodriguez Aguilera. I use the pronouns they/she and this is very important for me to say. I identify as a non-binary person. This is also very important for me to say. I was born and raised in Puebla, Mexico and I did my undergrad in Social Anthropology there. I did my Masters in Social Anthropology in Mexico City and then I did my PhD in Latin American Studies, with a concentration in Anthropology at the University of Texas at Austin. Right after finishing my Ph.D., I had a position as an Assistant Professor of Latin American and Latinx Studies and Anthropology at Lake Forest College. After two years, I'm really excited to be joining DePaul University and the Latin American and Latino Studies Department starting this fall.

How was the transition of moving from Puebla to Texas?

It was a lot. English is not my first language. I learned it growing up but I actually started speaking English while in my PhD. I had to because otherwise, I would have not been able to do a PhD in the US. It was that and obviously, the culture shock since I’m from the southern part of Mexico. The central part of Mexico is another

world. Puebla has a lot of indigenous communities and is very rich in farming. It was a lot of shock but I would say once I settled in and I started getting to know my community in Austin, I really enjoyed my time there. I got know about the story of Chicanos coming from California, but also Tejanos, born and raised in Texas, the story behind a state like Texas, and just knowing the community and social movements there. After seven years, I always miss Austin at this point in my life. Since I made such a great community there I think Austin is always going to be in my heart.

Dr. Yoalli Rodriguez Aguilera

Where have you traveled to recently?

This summer, I went to Edinburgh in Scotland and to Berlin in Germany. I was invited to give a talk at a conference about gender, colonialism and environment. Scholars and professors from all over the world were invited to have a two day seminar about different issues surrounding toxicity, colonialism, and gender. It was in the Royal Gardens of Edinburgh and it was really nice to be with other scholars talking about these issues and how it happens in the Global South. Just knowing other scholars that are doing critical work was really amazing as well. In Berlin I got to meet Latin American people who are living there, people from Palestine, and getting to see decolonial movements in Berlin. It was great to be surrounding myself with communities that are building powerful things in other parts of the world.

What drew you to working on issues surrounding environmental racism, colonialism, racialized geography, grief and feminism in Latin America?

We don't talk enough about racism in Mexico and Latin America. It's very clear in the US. We talk a lot about it and it’s very identified since there's a lot of open discussions about racism in this country. But we usually romanticize or idolize Mexico or Latin America saying there's no racism there, where in reality it is the opposite. It is just as racist in Mexico as in the US, especially towards indigenous and black communities. There are people who don't know about the existence of Afro-Mexican people. Up until 2019 the black population in Mexico was not even recognized by the federal constitution. Meanwhile, there are indigenous people everywhere and yet they are still facing

dispossession, facing discrimination in their everyday life. So I feel that my research wanted to encourage the discussion and the open debate about how Mexico is also a racist country, and that we have to talk about it, even if it's uncomfortable for many of us. We have to talk about the roots of colonialism, the roots of racism, the roots of a lot of colonial structures that we still live with up until now, in Mexican and Latin American societies.

How has living in the US, especially in Chicago informed your work and how do you apply that to the work you have been doing?

Living in the US has only expanded how I want to work and with whom I want to work with. It has given me the opportunity to engage with authors, specifically black, indigenous, and POC authors that are doing critical work around racism, colonialism, hetero patriarchy, and all the systems of oppression that continuously exist. So, for me, engaging in the US with authors, but also social movements that are doing anti-racist work, anti-colonial work, has been really empowering and also inspiring. After living in Chicago for a year, I have found a really amazing community doing amazing work. I'm now part of the editorial board of Contratiempo, which has been great. This is a collective journal that is an autonomous project, publishing the magazine all in Spanish, trying to share the work of Latin American people. These kinds of initiatives really excite me because while I’m doing scholarly work, I'm also part of communities that are trying to do something outside of academia, that are sharing knowledge and doing something. There's also a lot of community-based radio trying to do things, sharing the history of Latinx people in Illinois,

and specifically in Chicago. There are really powerful things happening in the community in Chicago and Illinois so I'm really excited to keep engaging with these types of initiatives.

Just to switch gears, what has been your favorite part about teaching?

Seeing students think critically gives me hope about life in the world. I feel that we're living in a world full of violence. There's a lot of hopelessness in the world, a lot of despair. So when I’m in front of my classroom, when I'm with my students, and we think and we imagine, and we discuss critically about the world, it gives me hope about new generations and about how to have a more fair world. In my classes, I really raise up voices of historically underrepresented communities so we read a lot of black, indigenous, POC authors, and a lot of activists. I feel that my pedagogical commitment is to build a safe environment for students because social justice is at the center of who I am. The classroom is a really important space for me. As a scholar, I think about the classroom as a place of activism. How can we build hope around this world? How can we fight for social justice? For me, what’s really fulfilling is when I'm with students who are thinking critically, being proud of who they are and their cultures and doing whatever they want, but enjoying life. It gives me hope, and I enjoy it. I really love teaching. I feel that it is like a mission. I'm really committed to teaching and that my students enjoy my teaching, and that it feels like a safe space where they can come and think critically. That we hear each other respectfully, but also go deep into what are the roots of oppression.

We have to talk about the roots of colonialism, the roots of racism, the roots of a lot of colonial structures that we still live with up until now.

What do you look forward to about serving the Latinx student body at DePaul?

I'm really excited about coming to DePaul. I know there's a thriving Latinx community inside the university. I’m excited to learn about all the initiatives that students are doing. Getting involved as much as I can, even as a faculty advisor or just supporting the initiatives. Of course, in my classroom, I'm really excited about trying to share and also learn from students about Latin America, about the Latinx community in the U.S. from a critical perspective. That we discuss, that we share ideas, that we share how we feel, that we share knowledge and experiences. I'm also excited to imagine ways of having direct communication or a bridge between the Latinx community in Chicago and the university. I know there are already initiatives, but as a professor, as a scholar at DePaul, I want to be involved in those initiatives. Also as part of my classroom and my pedagogy, I want there to be more community engagement with the Latinx community in Chicago and with the university.