Sarah Quesada
Assistant Professor of English
Faculty Affiliate, Institute for Latino Studies
Specialties: Latino/a and Transnational Literature; Hispanic Caribbean Literature and Afro-Latina/o; African Diaspora Studies.
Degrees: BA, Hope College; MA, University of Georgia; PhD, Stanford University
Dr. Sarah Margarita Quesada’s research and teaching interests include 20th and 21st century Latina/o, Chicana/o, Transnational literatures and spatial theory. Her main focus is on the constructions of race, ethnicity, migration, and spiritual formation of the Latino/a African Diaspora in literature and film, read through a decolonial lens. Her book project explores the uneven distribution of slave trade memory across the Atlantic by drawing comparisons between West African heritage sites and Latin American and Latina/o storytelling. Examining mostly contemporary representations of transatlantic memory, Dr. Quesada's study reassesses the ontological nature of the transCaribbean narrative and conveys the many ways in which Atlantic history and cosmology are presented within the margins of texts, in the foundations of nation-building myths, but also at the intersection of conservation projects and fiction. Ultimately this project expands the limits of Latinidad into the Atlantic World, through works by Rudolfo Anaya, Gabriel García Márquez, Alejo Carpentier, Achy Obejas, Junot Diaz, and Dahlma Llanos Figueroa. Dr. Quesada is a former Postdoctoral Associate in the department of Latina/Latino studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and ACLS Andrew Mellon fellow.
Contact Information:
213 Decio Faculty Hall
(574) 631-3817
squesada@nd.edu
Postal Address:
Department of English
356 O’Shaughnessy Hall
Notre Dame, IN 46556