Karla Yaritza Maravilla Zaragoza

Karla Yaritza Maravilla Zaragoza (she/her/ella) is an English PhD student, LASER graduate participant, and Joseph Gaia Distinguished Fellow in Latino Studies at the University of Notre Dame. Her research examines Latinx literature at the intersection of health, religion, education, and sustainability, with a focus on how latinidad shapes narratives of labor, wellness, spirituality, and ecojustice in the hyper-contemporary. She is especially interested in the figure of the curandera in Mexican-American literature as a reoccurring ancestral presence that reframes health and personhood while deconstructing colonial legacies in Western medicine. Her ultimate goal is to advocate for using Curanderismo in the U.S. public health care system to increase accessibility for lower-income families.

In addition to conducting research and writing essays, she is a poet from the Pacific Northwest whose work explores illness, myth, and sacrifice in the experiences of migrant farmworkers in the Yakima Valley and across the United States. She was the first poet featured in Poetry Northwest’s “Presenting” series for up-and-coming poets, praised for her language and aesthetic, described as “an agricultural beat, a field worker’s beat, a hot beat—[that] becomes prayer.” Her poetry has since appeared in The Acentos Review, Palette Poetry, and Huizache. Her manuscript “La Casa Negra” was a 2022 semifinalist for the Andrés Montoya Poetry Prize. Her favorite poets are Natalie Diaz, Xavier Cavazos, and Natalie Scenters Zapico.

Education

Degrees:

Central Washington University, BA—English Language and Literature & Professional and Creative Writing, Summa Cum Laude.

Certificates:

Curanderismo: Traditional Healing Using Plants, University of New Mexico.

Professional Writing Certificate, Central Washington University.

Recent Scholarly Activities

Publications:

“American Dream” and “flotando en la línea, nuestra virgen reza sobre una estrellita.” Huizache: The New Magazine of America.

“Maria’s Jawbone” and “Declaration from the Hopyard.” Palette Poetry.

“Nos Pasamos de la Raya,” “POLICIACA,” and “Madre Morena.” The Acentos Review.

“Caulked by the Linoleum Roses, I Read You the Song of Dimples,” Volume 16, Number 2, Winter & Spring 2022, Poetry Northwest.

Presentations:

“The Worldmaking and Worldbreaking Practices of Contemporary Latinx Poetry” at the 16th annual Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present (ASAP) Conference, Rice University, Houston, Texas (October 23-25, 2025).

“Mestizaje through Epidemic: Curanderismo as Spiritual Healing in Alejandro Morales’ The Rag Doll Plagues.” Paper presented February 26th, 2022 at the 43rd annual SWPACA conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Positions Held:

Instructor of Record, University Writing Program, University of Notre Dame—“WR 13200: Wellness Through Composition—Exploring Rhetorical Strategies in Illness Narratives” (Fall 2025).

Graduate Writing Tutor, University Writing Center, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN (2024- Present).

Teaching Assistant, Department of Film, Theatre, and Television, University of Notre Dame— “FTT 20101: Basics of Film and Television” (Fall 2024)

Teaching Assistant, Department of American Studies, University of Notre Dame— “AMST 12100/22100: Introduction to American Studies” (Spring 2025)

Editorial Assistant, Notre Dame Review, Department of English at the University of Notre Dame (Sept. 2023-May 2024).

Research and Teaching Assistant, Ronald E. McNair Office, Central Washington University, Ellensburg, WA (Feb. 2023–June 2023).