简介

Emma Pérez, born in El Campo, Texas, has published essays in history and feminist theory as well as The Decolonial Imaginary: Writing Chicanas into History. The book introduces her argument regarding the decolonial imaginary and is cited frequently. Her essay, “Sexuality and Discourse: Notes from a Chicana Survivor,” has been reprinted in various anthologies and has been quoted from repeatedly for the concept, “sitio y lengua.” Pérez’s novel, Gulf Dreams, was first published in 1996 and was considered one of the first Chicana lesbian novels in print. Aunt Lute Books reissued the second edition in May 2009. From 1990 until 2003, she was a faculty member of the Department of History, University of Texas, El Paso. In fall 2003, she joined the Department of Ethnic Studies at University of Colorado, Boulder where she is currently Chair and Full Professor. Her recent novel, Forgetting the Alamo, Or, Blood Memory, (University of Texas Press, 2009) is a “Chicana lesbian western” that challenges white-male-centered westerns. The novel was awarded the Christopher Isherwood Writing Grant in December 2009, won 2nd place in Historical Fiction from International Latino Books and was a finalist in Fiction from the Lambda Literary Fiction Awards as well as a finalist in Historical Fiction from the Golden Crown Literary Awards. She is currently conducting research on a speculative novel that uses Antonio Guadí’s architecture in Barcelona as the backdrop and landscape of the novel. Pérez continues to theorize how our work may decolonize race and sexuality.