As part of the Undisciplined: Writing & Creating Otherwise in Latinx & Caribbean Studies Speaker Series, the lecture “Against Olvido: Motherhood, Memory and the Mangle” will be presented by Dr. Yomaira Figueroa-Vásquez.
In this lecture, Dr. Figueroa-Vásquez traces the life of Catalina López, her ancestors, and descendants through an interrogation of archival records and intimate histories of motherhood, labor, disappearance, and femicide in the wake of abolition and U.S. occupation in Vega Baja, Puerto Rico. By illuminating Catalina’s life and legacy, the talk reveals the “mangle” (mangrove) that shapes Black Puerto Rican familial and national histories across the archipelago and the diaspora.
The event is supported by the Rutgers–New Brunswick Department of Latino and Caribbean Studies, the Department of History, the Institute for the Study of Global Racial Justice, and the Rutgers Advanced Institute for Critical Caribbean Studies.