Save the date!

The virtual artist panel for the fall exhibition, Crossing Relations: Migrations and Possible Worlds, invites us to sense modes of relation made in migration and diasporic contexts between people, landscapes, animals, flora, and other entities.

[Artwork Thumbnail: Victoria Martinez ]

Join Dr. Maya Doig-Acuña, Dr. Ariana Curtis, Dr. Kaysha Corinealdi, Veronica Chambers, and Shyanne Figueroa Bennett for a panel dialogue exploring how Black Panamanian communities across New York and Central America have made and remade home.

Drawing on historian Christina De Lucia’s conceptualization of memoryscapes—as those “constellations of spots on the land that have accrued stories over time”—this panel of scholars, artists, and curators together explore histories of Black Panamanian placemaking and intimate remembrance of place. From the protection of local landmarks in Brooklyn amid gentrification, to the formation of autonomous community life in Colón, Panama, to the weaving of kinship networks in the former Canal Zone, to the multigenerational preservation of migrating objects and stories, we ask: What have Black Panamanian memoryscapes sustained, contested, or made politically possible?

Dr. Maya Doig-Acuña is the 2026-2027 Miriam Jiménez Román Fellow at The Latinx Project. Click here to read a Q&A with Dr. Doig-Acuña.

Supporters

The 2026-2027 Miriam Jiménez Román Fellowship is made possible in part with support from the Blanchette Hooker Rockefeller Fund.

[Artwork: Giana De Dier, featured in Intervenxions Vol. 5]

In Politics in Our Veins, Yalidy Matos, Domingo Morel, and Michelle Bueno Vásquez chart the rise of Dominican American political power across the United States, exploring the myriad factors that have contributed to their political success as thoughtful citizens, activists, and elected officials. On October 21, join us for a panel conversation marking the publication of the new book with the authors alongside Ramona Hernandez, Raquel Batista, and Cristina Beltrán. This event takes place at NYU Wagner (105 East 17th Street). Doors will open at 5pm, and the event begins at 5:30pm.

This event is organized by the NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and co-sponsored by The Latinx Project.

About the Book

Dominican Americans are one of the largest and fastest-growing Latinx groups in the United States, with a population that has quadrupled from 517,000 to a little over 2.3 million as of 2023. While New York City is home to the largest Dominican community in the country—and is where most Dominican American elected officials (DEOs) are from—Dominican Americans continue to increase their representation nationwide. Learn more via NYU Press.

Panelists

Raquel Batista is an experienced civil rights and social impact leader in government, corporate and non-profit spaces. She previously served as the Commissioner of the NYC Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, as Executive Director of the Northern Manhattan Coalition for Immigrant Rights and more recently at the New York City Asylum Application Center assisting hundreds of recently arrived migrants with their humanitarian applications. A second-generation Afro-Dominicana, Latina, and lifelong New Yorker, Ms. Batista has been advocating for the rights of immigrant New Yorkers for over two decades.

Ramona Hernández is a Distinguished Professor of Sociology and the Director of the CUNY Dominican Studies Institute, both at The City College of New York. She also holds faculty affiliations with the International Migration MA Program and the Sociology PhD Program at the CUNY Graduate Center. She is also the Executive Director of the Inter-University Program for Latino Research. Dr. Hernández’s latest publication, From Immigrants to Settled People: Dominicans in the United States, co-authored with Gregory Morton, is forthcoming from Lived Places Publishing Press. She was also recently selected as one of the 2026 Latino Trailblazers by City & State New York.

Yalidy Matos is Associate Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University. She is the author of Moral and Immoral Whiteness in Immigration Politics. Matos has been the recipient of the 2022 American Political Science Association Distinguished Junior Scholar in Political Psychology Award and a 2024-2025 Russel Sage Foundation Visiting Scholar.

Domingo Morel is Associate Professor of Political Science and Public Service at the Robert F. Wagner School of Public Service at New York University. He is the author and co-editor of several books, including Takeover: Race, Education, and American Democracy, which won the W.E.B. Du Bois Distinguished Book Award, and most recentlyDeveloping Scholars: Race, Politics, and the Pursuit of Higher Education.

Michelle Bueno Vásquez is a Doctoral Student in Political Science at Northwestern University.

Cristina Beltrán works at the intersection of Latinx politics and political theory. She is an associate professor and director of graduate studies in the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis. Her work has appeared in Political Theory, the Du Bois Review, Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies, Political Research Quarterly, and various edited volumes. She is currently the co-editor of Theory & Event, a peer-reviewed journal that publishes work by scholars working at the intersections of political theory, cultural theory, political economy, aesthetics, philosophy, and the arts. She is also an occasional guest on MSNBC.

[Book Cover: NYU Press]

Join a discussion of Visualizing Latinx: Creative Practices in Fashion, Film, and Beyond by Prof. Arlene Dávila at the Ford Foundation Center for Social Justice. This event highlights contemporary Latinx creators who challenge systemic erasure and transform society on their own terms by approaching their work with purpose, intention, and style.

The panel features Brownsville artist Josué Ramírez (Rawmirez), fashion editor Keyla Marquez, filmmaker Alex Rivera, and academic leader Yomaira Figueroa. Together, they will discuss their interdisciplinary practices and explore the transformative power of Latinx visual culture. Reception to follow and signed copies of Visualizing Latinx are available, subject to availability.

[Image: Lujo Depot, styled by Keyla Marquez]

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Historians Eladio Bobadilla and Mary E. Mendoza present new scholarship on US-Mexico migration in a conversation moderated by Irvin Ibarguen.

[Book Cover Detail: Dangerous Migration, U. Illinois Press]

Save the date! Join us December 4 for the panel discussion Counterhistories of Latinx Social Media. The program is moderated by Urayoán Noel and marks the launch of his new book Virtually Latinx: Identities in the Age of Social Media (University of Texas Press).

About the Book

In the first-ever study of Latinx social media, Urayoán Noel shows how historically marginalized Latinxs—including Black, Trans, undocumented, and disabled people—have used digital platforms to challenge hegemonic Latinidad and to build alternatives communities.

Incorporating elements of history, ethnography, and performance studies, Virtually Latinx traces the evolution of Latinx social media and blogging since the early 1990s, focusing on creative movements and vocabularies emerging and consolidating online. From Chicano/LatinoNet, Latina Lista, and Remezcla, to activists and performers on TikTok, online creators and platforms have spurred modes of art and activism that counter both Latinidad’s essentialized body politics and Big Tech’s domination of the information sphere. In dialogue with scholars of media, virtuality, and identity, Noel theorizes how hashtags like #Afrolatina, #Latinx, and #Latine have not only facilitated online exchange but also nurtured new knowledge formations surrounding Black, feminist, undocuqueer, Trans, and disability poetics and politics. Click to learn more and purchase the book.

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Scholars Kency Cornejo, Robb Hernandez, Josh T Franco, and Arlene Dávila discuss their recent books and multidisciplinary approaches to decolonizing art histories. This event takes place at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

[Artwork: Guadalupe Maravilla]

Join us for a final open house marking the close of our fall exhibition Crossing Relations: Migrations and Possible Worlds. Light refreshments and sweets will be provided.