A.
GABRIEL MELÉNDEZ
Professor and Chair of American Studies
Professor Meléndez is a literary, social and
cultural critic with research interests in ethnic and cultural
representations in film, autobiography, ethnopoetics and ethnocritical
theory. His teaching and research interests overlap across three
American Studies concentrations Culture Studies, Southwest Studies
and Race, Class and Ethnicity. He has been the recipient of a
Rockefeller Humanities Fellowship and several other research
grants including awards from the New Mexico Endowment for the
Humanities, Center for Regional Studies (UNM) and the Recovering
the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage Project (University of Houston).
His first book, So All is Not Lost: The Poetics of
Print in Nuevomexicano Communities, 1836-1958 (UNM,
1997) has recently been reprinted by the University of
Arizona under the title, Spanish-Language Newspapers
in New Mexico, 1836-1958 (2005). In addition, he
is co-editor of The Multicultural Southwest: A Reader (Arizona,
2001) and Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage:
Volume VI (2006). His other works include Reflexiones
del Corazón (1993) [a portfolio of images and texts
produced with Miguel Gandert and María Baca for the
Tamarind Institute] and The Biography of Casimiro Barela (UNM,
2003).
The author of several articles and chapter-length studies,
Meléndez is currently engaged in new work on ethnic film
representations and readying a new manuscript, “Film Dramas
in New Mexico: Cultural Encounters On and Off the Screen” for
publication. Meléndez is on the board of directors
of the Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage Project,
serves on the editorial board of the journal Confluence, is
a general editor for the Pasó por aquí Series on
New Mexican Hispanic Letters at UNM Press.
In the spring of 2006 he presented papers at The Society for
Multi-Ethnic Studies: Europe and the Americas at the University
of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain and was invite to lecture at the
University of Las Palmas on the Canary Islands. As
one of three scholars invited to participate in Lasting Impressions:
The Private Presses of New Mexico, an educational project
sponsored by the Office of the State Historian Meléndez
put together “Ancestor Words”(see accompanying text)
a program presented at the Mesilla Cultural Center in La Mesilla,
New Mexico and later at the National Hispanic Cultural Center
of New Mexico in Albuquerque.
Meléndez teaches graduate seminars on autobiography and
ethnic life writing, Latino/a-Chicano/a film, critical regionalism
and the politics of identity in the Southwest.
Publications
The Pasó por Aquí Series: Recovering the Nuevomexicano Literary Heritage (UNM, 2011)
Books:
So All is Not Lost: The Poetics of Print in
Nuevomexicano Communities, 1836-1958 (UNM, 1997)
The Multicultural Southwest: A Reader (Arizona,
2001)
The Biography of Casimiro Barela (UNM, 2003)
Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage: Volume VI (Arte
Público, 2006)
Selected Articles:
“Who are the ‘salt of the earth’? Competing
Images of Mexican Americans in Salt of the Earth and And
Now, Miguel” in Expressing Culture: Essays on
Nuevomexicana/o Creativity, Everyday Ritual, and Oppositional
Remembrance, Phillip Gonzales, editor, (forthcoming, University
of Arizona Press)
“Nuevo México by Any Other Name: Creating a State
from an Ancestral Homeland,” in Contested Homeland:
A Chicano History of New Mexico, David Maciel and Erlinda
Gonzales-Berry, editors
University of New Mexico Press, 2000: 143-168.
Recent Talks:
“Ancestor Words: Recovering the Nuevomexicano Literary
Legacy,” Mesilla Cultural Center in La Mesilla, New Mexico
on July 14, 2006 and National Hispanic Cultural Center of New
Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, July 22, 2006.
“Ejemplos Metafóricos”: Reconsiderations
on the Origins of Chicana Autobiography and Life-Narrative,” University
of Las Palmas, Canary Islands, Spain, May 25, 2006.
“Post-1848 Mexicano Life-Narratives as
Symbolic Biography: The Biography of Casimiro Barela,” 5th
MESEA Conference, University of Navarra, Pamplona, Spain, May 20,
2006.
Courses
AM ST 508 Seminar in Cultural Autobiography
AM ST 560 Seminar on the Southwest: A Critical Region
AM ST 363/563 Chicano/Latino Film.
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