LatinX studies: Variations and velocities

Abstract

At the core of this Cultural Dynamics special issue on “LatinX Studies: Variations and Velocities” are new conceptual approaches, epistemological workings, “keywords,” and modes of inquiry that enable us to theorize LatinX Studies and global LatinXness for the twenty-first century. Bringing together different research communities from art, art history, cultural anthropology, cultural studies, geography, history, journalism, and literature, this exploratory undertaking offers a working language on present-day LatinX preoccupations to seize what is happening contemporaneously in light of the field’s “X” and to disseminate it in a usable format like this journal. The volume’s contributors—Jill Anderson, Gloria Elizabeth Chacón, Nicholas De Genova, María DeGuzmán, Rene Galvan, Hilda Lloréns and Maritza Stanchich, Mark Overmyer-Velázquez, and Fredo Rivera—put forward new formulations and models for Latino/a Studies in considering LatinX geographies beyond the Americas; indigenous migrations and cultural production; Miami’s oceanic borderlands; environmental planetary problems and environmental knowledges; LatinX medical subjects; and deported exiles. The breadth of foci herein invites further problematization and dialogue with implications and relevance to other fields.