Research Interests

Workshops and Presentations

• (Above) Workshop on Latinos and internalized racist oppression in Chicago with Lutheran executives and staff of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America at their national headquarters.
•   Fall 1999 I was in St. Louis, MO, Detroit, Michigan, and at the University of California, Irvine speaking about racism, Latinos and Puerto Rico's colonial situation.
• February 2000,  paper read on the racialization of Latinos read for the Chicano/Latino faculty colloquy at California State University Long Beach
• "Subjects or Citizens?: Puerto Ricans in the World's Oldest Colony" paper read in panel "Immigration and Citizenship" at the Rainbow Festival & Conference 2000 event at the CrossCultural Center of the University of California Irvine, November 9, 2000.
• "Education of the Heart: Cesar Chavez" Keynote address (March 2001) during the inauguration of the week of Cesar Chavez, celebrating the establishment of an official holiday in his memory. California State University, Long Beach.
• “We Need a New Mirror: Latinos As Resources in 21st Century U.S.A.” Keynote address to UNITY conference banquet hosted by the university president’s office and the office of Multi cultural Affairs at the University of Minnesota, Moorhead. April 23, 2001.
• “Improve Relationships in a Culturally Diverse Community”  seminar led at the UNITY conference hosted by the office of Multi cultural Affairs at the University of Minnesota, Moorhead. April 24, 2001.
• “Losing your Latino Identity” panel presentation at the “Conferencia Cultural” sponsored by the Pan-American Latino Society (PALS) at the University of California, Irvine, May 17, 2001.

• “Issues in the Latino Community” powerpoint presentation at the Latinos in Higher Education Conference, University Student Union, May 1, 2002 at California State University, Long Beach.    

•  “The Latino Urban Experience” presentation at the Urban Institute, Concordia University, Irvine, May 28, 2002.
•    “Vieques: Paradise Invaded” lecture at  Avenue 50, Art Gallery, Highland Park, CA on June 30, 2002.

•    “Latino and Chicanos: Who Are We?” lecture sponsored by the Student Activities Offices of the University of Colorado, Denver and Metropolitan State University at the Tivoli Ballroom, September 30, 2002 in Denver, Colorado.

•     “Census 2000 Says We Are White: Racism and Identity in Puerto Rico” chaired and organized panel at the biennial meeting of the Puerto Rican Studies Association Conference, Congress Plaza Hotel, Chicago October 5, 2002.  

•     “Racism and identity in Puerto Rico” paper read in panel “Census 2000 Says We Are White: Racism and Identity in Puerto Rico”  at the biennial meeting of the Puerto Rican Studies Association Conference, Congress Plaza Hotel, Chicago October 5, 2002.

•         “The Racialization of Asian, Mexican and Puerto Rican Workers, 1890-1930s” a paper read at the National Association for Asian and Pacific American Education and the Pacific American Education Caucus, California Teachers Association 2003 conference, April 5, 2003, at the Queen Mary, Long Beach California.

•   “Latinos and Cultural Racism” presentation for the Institute for Democratic Renewal and Project Change (Claremont Graduate University, CA) at their national network meeting at the Ward Room, Summerfield Suites, Seattle, WA on September 20, 2003. 

• “Anti-Racism Training and Organizing Seminar” North Central Washington Coalition to Dismantle Racism (NCWCDR) Leavenworth, WA  June 17-22, 2004.
• "Lessons from Vieques: The Construction of a Collective Memory of Oppresion" paper read at panel "Vieques: History and Memory" Puerto Rican Studies Association Bi-Annual Conference, CUNY Graduate Center, New York, October 23, 2004.
• "Internalization and At Risk Behaviors: Racialization and Latinos" workshop modules for continuing education units (C.E.U.) for the Minnesota Association for Recovery Resources, River Centre Convention Center, St. Paul, Minnesota, October 28, 2004.
• "Building the Good Society: Race, Wealth and Poverty in the United States,"  presentation for the ELCA Consultation on Wealth and Poverty, El Caribe Resort Hotel, Daytona Beach FL, March 4-5, 2005. 
• "'Color-Blind' Ideology and the Retention and Success of Students of Color in Higher Education" a Keynote presentation to faculty and directors of diversity and affirmative action at the “Exploring Diversity in Higher Education: Building the Human Capacity” conference sponsored by the Diversity and Multiculturalism Division, Office of the Chancellor of the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities at Metropolitan State University, St. Paul, Minnesota, on Monday, April 2, 2007.
• “Anti-Racist Leadership and Strategies for University Presidents” a Keynote presentation to the 32 presidents and the chancellor of the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities system sponsored by the office of the Chancellor at the Wells Fargo Place, St. Paul, Minnesota on April 2, 2007. 

· “The Recruitment, Hiring and Retention of Under-represented Faculty and Staff” Seminar was co-facilitated with Dr. Emily Drew, Willamette University, Oregon and sponsored by Rollins College, Florida, Dean of Faculty and the Diversity Committee September 11-12, 2008. 

• “Organizing an Institutional Transformation Team for Diversity” Seminar co-facilitated with Dr. Emily Drew, Willamette University, Oregon for the College of Education and Human Development at the University of North Dakota, November 14, 2008.  

RESEARCH INTERESTS/ONGOING WORK

· I am interested in the role of racialization on the political behavior of Latinos and education, particularly Chicanos/Mexican Americans and Puerto Ricans.

• I am also interested in anti-racist community based organizing in contrast to Saul Alinski's, Industrial Areas Foundation model of class based community organizing. Benjamin Marquez' article ("The Industrial Areas Foundation and Mexican ..." in Pursuing Power Chris Garcia Ed., 1997) on the IAF experience is illustrative of the limits of Alinsky class-only style organizing. I am also beginning to look at what William Diaz' ("Latino Participation in American - Associational and Political Roles," in Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences 18:2 1996) calls links between community organizations and political behavior, in the context of a case study of anti-racist community based organizing in California's Santa Ana Latino community.
• I am working in the collection of Mr. Ismael Guadalupe's (one of the earliest leaders of the Vieques' social movement) and other leaders memoirs, as part of a project to develop a political memoir of the lessons of the Viequense social movement.

  Publications

• "Puerto Ricans" in The Latino Encyclopedia, Richard Chabran and Rafael Chabran, Eds New York: Marshall Cavendish, 1996.
• "Puerto Rican Migration" in The Latino Encyclopedia, Richard Chabran and Rafael Chabran, Eds New York: Marshall Cavendish, 1996.
• "Minority Status of Latinos" in The Latino Encyclopedia, Richard Chabran and Rafael Chabran, Eds New York: Marshall Cavendish, 1996.
• "The Racialization of Puerto Rican Ethnicity in the U.S." in Aaron Ramos and Juan Manuel Carrion Eds. Ethnicity, Race and Nationality in the Caribbean Rio Piedras: Institute of Caribbean Studies, University of Puerto Rico, 1997
• "Boricuas, African Americans, and Chicanos in the "Far West": Notes on the Puerto Rican Pro Independence Movement in California, 1960s-1980s" in New Political Science Volume 20, Number 4, December, 1998 pp. 421-439. Also to appear in Rodolfo Torres and George Katsifiacas Eds. Latino Social Movement Routledge Pubs, Spring, 1999.
• "The Racialization of Mexicans and Puerto Ricans: 1890a-1930s"  in CENTRO Journal of the Center for Puerto Rican Studies, Hunter College, CUNY refereed Journal,  Spring 2005.
• Latino Politics in the United States: Race, Ethnicity, Gender and Class in the Mexican American and Puerto Rican Experience. Dubuque,IA: Kendall-Hunt, 2005. This book received an honorable mention in the Gustavus Myer Center 2005 Outstanding Book Award among 300 books reviewed.
• “The Racialization of Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans and Asians, 1890s-1930s” in Eds. John N. Tsuchida, Juan M. Benítez and Dean S. Toji. Education, Youth, Leadership and Labor: Asian Pacific American and Latino Perspectives. Long Beach, CA: Center for Asian Pacific American Studies, 2007.

 “The Puzzle of Race and Politics: The Puerto Rican Experience” Web Published in CounterPunch, June 4, 2008. http://www.counterpunch.org/rodriguez06042008.html.