Alana de Hinojosa

Alana is a PhD alumni in the César E. Chávez Department of Chicana/o Studies at UCLA.  Her research is concerned with histories of displacement, diaspora, and refusal, and what these have to do with the Río Grande. In her dissertation on the Chamizal Land Dispute, she broadly asks: How might the meandering Rio Grande both demonstrate and assist us in re-imagining alternative and more just geographies? Alana also holds dual graduate concentration certificates in American Indian Studies and Critical Writing Pedagogy from UCLA. In the latter, she specializes in English as a Second Language (ESL). Alana is also a poet and co-founder of UCLA’s Bruins of Color Creative Writing Workshop—the first UCLA creative writing workshop for undergraduates, graduates, and staff of color. Over the last four years, more than 50 Bruins of color have been members of this workshop. Alana is also an alum of Community of Writers at Squaw Valley and the Macondo Writers Workshop. Her poetry has been published in Huizache, Duende, The Normal School, The Acentos Review, Kweli Journal, Blue Mesa Review, and The Florida Review’s Latinx special feature issue, among others. At UCLA, she has been a recipient of several scholarships, fellowships, and grants, including: the IUPLR/UIC-Mellon Latina/o Studies Fellowship, the Shirley Hune Inter-Ethnic/Inter-Racial Studies Award from UCLA’s American Indian Studies Center, the Ford Pre-Doctoral Fellowship, and UCLA’s Gold Shield Alumni Fellowship. Her dissertation committee consists of Alicia Gaspar de Alba (Co-Chair), Genevieve Carpio (Co-Chair), Sherene Razack, and Harryette Mullen.

Academic Publications

Forthcoming: “El Río Grande as Pedagogy: The Unruly, Unresolved Terrains of the Chamizal Land Dispute,” American Quarterly, December 2021.

“Review of Alex Wick’s The Red Sea: In Search of Lost Space.” The AAG Review of Books 5(1) 2017: 10-12

Poetry/Prose Publications

“Liz.” The Tishman Review (2016).

“Sombras nada más.” Special Latinx Feature in The Florida Review 42.2 (2018): 35-36.

“Playa de los muertos.” The Normal School 11.2 (2018): 62.

“Prayer after demolition.” The Normal School 11.2 (2018): 64.

“Prayer after demolition in an unrecognized village,” The Acentos Review (2018): http://www.acentosreview.com/november2017/alana-de-hinojosa.html

“24, next june.” Kweli Journal (2017): http://www.kwelijournal.org/fiction/2017/11/30/24-next-june-by-alana-de-hinojosa

“How to speak.” Duende (2017): http://www.duendeliterary.org/alana-de-hinojosa

“Even now.” Track//Four (2017): http://www.trackfourjournal.com/alana-de-hinojosa–even-now.html

“Preguntas y frases para una nieta America.” Huizache (2017).

“Marcela.” Cutbank Literary Journal (2016).

B.A., Latina/o Studies & Creative Writing; Hampshire College

M.A., Chicana/o Studies; UCLA

Ph.D, Chicano and Central American Studies, UCLA

Graduate Concentration Certificate; American Indian Studies, UCLA

Graduate Concentration Certificate; Writing Pedagogy, UCLA

Chamizal Land Dispute and Treaty

Borderlands History

Latinx Geographies

Displacement, Dispossession

Identity, Belonging

Settler Colonialism

Place-making practices

Land

Whiteness & Property

Oral Histories, Archival Research, Arts-based Inquiries; Qualitative Methods

Dean’s Fund for the Study of Diversity and Racial Inequality, UCLA (2021)

Shirley Hune Inter-Ethnic/Inter-Racial Studies Award, UCLA (2020-21)

IUPLR/UIC Mellon Latina/o Studies Fellows Program (2020-21)

The Founders’ Dissertation Fellowship from the Western Association of Women Historians (2020)

Gold Shield Alumnae of UCLA Fellowship (2019-20)

Institute of American Cultures Research Grant, UCLA (2019-20)

Latinx Geographies Best Graduate Student Paper, American Association of Geographers (2019)

Ford Foundation Pre-Doctoral Fellowship (2017-20)

Institute of American Cultures Research Grant, UCLA (2017-18)

Graduate Summer Research Mentorship, UCLA (2018)

Graduate Research Mentorship, UCLA (2017-18)

Graduate Dean’s Scholar Award, UCLA (2015)