Bridging
How Gloria Anzaldúa's Life and Work Transformed Our Own
The inspirational writings of cultural theorist and social justice activist Gloria Anzaldúa have empowered generations of women and men throughout the world. Charting the multiplicity of Anzaldúa's impact within and beyond academic disciplines, community trenches, and international borders, Bridging presents more than thirty reflections on her work and her life, examining vibrant facets in surprising new ways and inviting readers to engage with these intimate, heartfelt contributions.
Bridging is divided into five sections: The New Mestizas: "transitions and transformations"; Exposing the Wounds: "You gave me permission to fly in the dark"; Border Crossings: Inner Struggles, Outer Change; Bridging Theories: Intellectual Activism with/in Borders; and "Todas somos nos/otras": Toward a "politics of openness." Contributors, who include Norma Elia Cantú, Elisa Facio, Shelley Fisher Fishkin, Aída Hurtado, Andrea Lunsford, Denise Segura, Gloria Steinem, and Mohammad Tamdgidi, represent a broad range of generations, professions, academic disciplines, and national backgrounds. Critically engaging with Anzaldúa's theories and building on her work, they use virtual diaries, transformational theory, poetry, empirical research, autobiographical narrative, and other genres to creatively explore and boldly enact future directions for Anzaldúan studies.
A book whose form and content reflect Anzaldúa's diverse audience, Bridging perpetuates Anzaldúa's spirit through groundbreaking praxis and visionary insights into culture, gender, sexuality, religion, aesthetics, and politics. This is a collection whose span is as broad and dazzling as Anzaldúa herself.
AnaLouise Keating, Professor of Women's Studies at Texas Woman's University, is an influential scholar in the development of Anzaldúan studies.
Gloria González-López is Associate Professor of Sociology, Faculty Associate at the Center for Mexican American Studies, and affiliated with the Center for Women's and Gender Studies and the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin.
- Con profunda gratitud
- Building Bridges, Transforming Loss, Shaping New Dialogues: Anzaldúan Studies for the Twenty-First Century (AnaLouise Keating and Gloria González-López)
- I. The New Mestizas: "transitions and transformations"
- 1. Bridges of conocimiento: Una conversación con Gloria Anzaldúa (Lorena M. P. Gajardo)
- 2. A Letter to Gloria Anzaldúa Written from 30, Feet and 25 Years after Her "Speaking in Tongues: A Letter to 3rd-World Women Writers" (ariel robello)
- 3. Deconstructing the Immigrant Self: The Day I Discovered I Am a Latina (Anahí Viladrich)
- 4. My Path of Conocimiento: How Graduate School Transformed Me into a Nepantlera (Jessica Heredia)
- 5. Aprendiendo a Vivir/Aprendiendo a Morir (Norma Elia Cantú)
- 6. Making Face, Rompiendo Barreras: The Activist Legacy of Gloria E. Anzaldúa (Aída Hurtado)
- II. Exposing the Wounds: "You gave me permission to fly into the dark"
- 7. Anzaldúa, Maestra (Sebastián José Colón-Otero)
- 8. "May We Do Work That Matters": Bridging Gloria Anzaldúa across Borders (Claire Joysmith)
- 9. A Call to Action: Spiritual Activism . . . an Inevitable Unfolding (Karina L. Céspedes)
- 10. Gloria Anzaldúa and the Meaning of Queer (Héctor Domínguez-Ruvalcaba)
- 11. Breaking Our Chains: Achieving Nos/otras Consciousness (Lei Zhang)
- 12. Conocimiento and Healing: Academic Wounds, Survival, and Tenure (Gloria González-López)
- III. Border Crossings: Inner Struggles, Outer Change
- 13. Letters from Nepantla: Writing through the Responsibilities and Implications of the Anzaldúan Legacy (Michelle Kleisath)
- 14. Challenging Oppressive Educational Practices: Gloria Anzaldúa on My Mind, in My Spirit (Betsy Eudey)
- 15. Living Transculturation: Confessions of a Santero Sociologist (Glenn Jacobs)
- 16. Acercándose a Gloria Anzaldúa to Attempt Community (Paola Zaccaria)
- 17. Learning to Live Together: Bridging Communities, Bridging Worlds (Shelley Fisher Fishkin)
- 18. Risking the Vision, Transforming the Divides: Nepantlera Perspectives on Academic Boundaries, Identities, and Lives (AnaLouise Keating)
- IV. Bridging Theories: Intellectual Activism with/in Borders
- 19. "To live in the borderlands means you" (Mariana Ortega)
- 20. A Modo de Testimoniar: Borderlands, Papeles, and U.S. Academia (EstheR Cuesta)
- 21. On Borderlands and Bridges: An Inquiry into Gloria Anzaldúa's Methodology (Jorge Capetillo-Ponce)
- 22. For Gloria, Para Mi (Mary Catherine Loving)
- 23. Chicana Feminist Sociology in the Borderlands (Elisa Facio and Denise A. Segura)
- 24. Embracing Borderlands: Gloria Anzaldúa and Writing Studies (Andrea A. Lunsford)
- V. Todas Somos Nos/otras: Toward a "Politics of Openness"
- 25. Hurting, Believing, and Changing the World: My Faith in Gloria Anzaldúa (Suzanne Bost)
- 26. Feels Like "Carving Bone": (Re)Creating the Activist-Self, (Re)Articulating Transnational Journeys, while Sifting through Anzaldúan Thought (Kavitha Koshy)
- 27. Shifting (Kelli Zaytoun)
- 28. "Darkness, My Night": The Philosophical Challenge of Gloria Anzaldúa's Aesthetics of the Shadow (María DeGuzmán)
- 29. The Simultaneity of Self- and Global Transformations: Bridging with Anzaldúa's Liberating Vision (Mohammad H. Tamdgidi)
- 30. For Gloria Anzaldúa . . . Who Left Us Too Soon (Gloria Steinem)
- 31. She Eagle: For Gloria Anzaldúa (Becky Thompson)
- Notes
- Glossary
- Works Cited
- Published Writings by Gloria E. Anzaldúa
- Contributors' Biographies
- Index
