Conference Presentations by Daniela Miranda
As a novel that deals with the many atrocities of slavery, Beloved seems to be mostly concerned w... more As a novel that deals with the many atrocities of slavery, Beloved seems to be mostly concerned with the impulses that make us want to dehumanize and hurt other human beings. Upon closer examination, the novel, however, reveals itself to be as much about love as it is about hatred. At different points in the narration, Sethe, Paul D, and Baby Suggs each ponder how best to love themselves and others within the limits imposed by slavery. Disturbed by Sethe's use of love to justify the murder of her child, Paul D even argues that Sethe's love might be " too thick, " prompting her to quickly reply that " Love is or it ain't. Thin love ain't love at all " (195).
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What topics do multilingual learners expect to write about when they enter their first postsecond... more What topics do multilingual learners expect to write about when they enter their first postsecondary composition classroom? Too often educators make assumptions about the types of writing topics students might find engaging only to witness students struggle later. Although many scholars have stressed the importance of considering how students' expectations impact their learning (, few studies have examined what types of topics students expect and/or want to write about in a first-year composition course. By conducting a qualitative survey of multilingual students enrolled in an introductory composition course, Miranda and Gowdy-Burke sought to identify students' expectations regarding composition course content. While the survey results confirm what educators have always known—students anticipate learning how to use sources and improve grammar—this survey also revealed that multilingual composition students have strong opinions on the kinds of topical knowledge they want to develop. During the presentation, the researchers will discuss the results of a pilot study focused on identifying students' preferences regarding writing topics. Although a winder sample of student responses is necessary to draw informed conclusions, preliminary results show that students have more varied topic interests than educators usually assume. This suggests that we should pay more attention to students' voices when selecting topics for the composition classroom.
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In an interview with Walter Mignolo, educational researcher Rubén Gaztambide-‐‑ Fernández poses ... more In an interview with Walter Mignolo, educational researcher Rubén Gaztambide-‐‑ Fernández poses a question worthy of consideration for anyone interested in the topic of decolonization: " Can concepts like 'philosopher' and/or 'artist' ever be completely decolonized? " (202) This project is driven by a related concern, that of whether the time of academia and the notion of the academic can ever be fully decolonized. Can academics of color from what is now popularly known as the Global South truly purport to talk about delinking from hegemonic discourses of temporality while writing within a system based on a rather rigid genealogy of accepted epistemologies? A system that demands that we demonstrate our familiarity with Kant, Benjamin, Foucault, Barthes, Derrida, and Deleuze, but not with the myriad of non-‐‑ Western thinkers (or even female Western thinkers) who have tackled similar topics? A system that to this day re-‐‑ enacts the spatialization and temporalization of what Mignolo calls " the colonial difference " — the relegation of non-‐‑ imperial languages and thinking processes to an inferior position on account of their perceived primitivism? The project that I would like to undertake during my time at the Summer Institute attempts to think through some of these questions by offering three possible decolonial options inspired by the work of scholars such as Walter Mignolo, Chela Sandoval, and Eric Hayot. The first of these options uses Sandoval's differential approach to power formations to imagine a way to turn towards knowledges that have been silenced, forgotten, or displaced, and stress the ways they precede, inform, or co-‐‑ exist with more widely accepted, and usually male, white, and Euro-‐‑ and U.S.-‐‑ centric, ways of thinking. A second decolonial option examines Hayot's notion of " institutional time " —the trend towards the naturalization of certain canonical periods—to begin to think of decolonization as something that is vital for everyone in academia, not only for academics of color. Finally, the third option that I propose applies Mignolo's concept of " re-‐‑ learning " to the work that we do as academics and educators. I hope that engaging other participants in a lively and productive debate about these options will allow me to begin to articulate concrete ways in which academics from all walks of life might begin to decolonize the time of academia not only through their own research practices but also through specific pedagogical interventions in their classrooms. These are all aspects that demand more sustained scholarly attention, and that I hope to develop in a manuscript that I am preparing for publication.
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In a recent interview with Meara Sharma for Guernica magazine, National Book Award finalist Claud... more In a recent interview with Meara Sharma for Guernica magazine, National Book Award finalist Claudia Rankine credits Lauren Berlant’s Cruel Optimism (2011) for giving her the vocabulary to write about the “incoherency” of race relations in America. Similarly, in Sex, or the Unbearable (2014), Berlant cites Rankine’s previous collection, Don’t Let me Be Lonely (2004), as an example of a handful of “documentary” texts that find potential for survival in scenes of devastation and loss (37-38). This short talk examined the productive, if virtual, relationship between Rankine’s poetry and Berlant’s theories in preparation for developing a full-length paper on how Rankine’s Citizen (2014) posits seemingly innocuous, every-day encounters with racism as unbearable moments that shatter the narrative of a post-racial, unified America. This talk asked participants to consider the following questions as we explored the place of race within the unbearable: Can race, like sex, act as a site for “an encounter with the estrangement and intimacy of being in relation” (viii)? How can the unbearability that Rankine explores in her poetry move us past sheer pessimism into forms of relationality predicated not on optimism but rather on “endurance” and “world-remagnetizing” (38)?
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Papers by Daniela Miranda
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Unlike much of the scholarship dealing with how manhood is constructed in Díaz’s works, this pape... more Unlike much of the scholarship dealing with how manhood is constructed in Díaz’s works, this paper contends that the masculinities embodied by the Yuniors (there are at least two different characters named “Yunior” in Díaz’s fiction) simultaneously enforce and disrupt dominant notions of masculinity. Although Díaz’s characters seem to embrace hegemonic notions of masculinity as a way to fit in, I argue that they are actually engaging in a form of “disidentificatory peformance.” According to queer scholar José Esteban Muñoz, rather than completely identifying or counteridentifying with the performatives that structure white supremacy, misogyny, or homophobia, minority subjects often appropriate and rework these ideologies through a process that he calls “disidentification.” This paper outlines how the male figures in Díaz’s fiction partially disidentify with the racist and homophobic slurs of “Haitian,” “pussy,” and “faggot” that dominant males use to subordinate a young Yunior. Rather than passively accepting this subordination, this paper contends that Yunior transforms the hailing of “Haitian” into a provisional and strategic, rather than fixed, category, and reforms the feminine and homophobic slurs into sites of queer desire.
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Since international student enrollment continues to rise at US universities, this paper... more Since international student enrollment continues to rise at US universities, this paper addresses how international student retention can be increased. We argue that programs, services, and events that bring together international and domestic students may not only help retain students, but may also develop the their global competency. In an increasingly diverse world, developing students’ global competency is key if we hope to help them to succeed at home or abroad.
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In this essay, I explore the comics and codex elements used in Codex Espangliensis, a collaborati... more In this essay, I explore the comics and codex elements used in Codex Espangliensis, a collaborative volume featuring performance texts by Guillermo Gómez-Peña, illustrations by Enrique Chagoya, and typographical montages by Felicia Rice. I argue that the authors of this text use comics and codex elements to challenge metanarratives about Latin American history and open up new possibilities for thinking about history, language, and identity in a modern globalized world.
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Conference Presentations by Daniela Miranda
Papers by Daniela Miranda