Student Curated Biographies

CPMR relies on the brilliance and motivation of many dedicated undergraduate students to preserve, identify, and create new content related to our holdings. These biographies reflect over 5 years' work by students whom have participated via classes, independent studies, and research seminars. Students are entirely responsible for the creation of these biographies and each biography is an ever-expanding, previously unavailable record of knowledge. Please contact us at chicanapormiraza@gmail.com with any concerns or updates to the information displayed here.

Sonia Lopez “My whole life was around my politics, my schoolwork and being a student was secondary.”

Sonia Lopez was born in Sonora, Mexico. She immigrated at a young age to the United States, moving to Imperial Valley before settling in Calexico, a border town in California.
Rita Sanchez “In order to complete my Ph.d at UCSD and get tenure at SDSU, I had three full time jobs: full time mother; full time grad student; and full time professor.”

Rita Sanchez was born and brought up in San Bernardino, California, seventh of eleven children. Her parents and their parents were from New Mexico, which had been home to her family for generations. Her ancestors were, in her words, the “first mestizos,” because of intermarriage between Spanish and Indian. This history, Sanchez points out, was the beginning of her “Chicana coming-to-consciousness,” the pride in her heritage, a tradition that she has celebrated throughout her life.

Olivia Puentes Reynolds "I was making the declaration about not just being a Mexican American. I was a Chicana. It had nothing to do with what other people said, it is my declaration and it came from me."

Olivia Puentes Reynolds sits for her interview with a guitar on her knee. Hers is a story of music and mythology, her activism inspired by poetry. Reynolds’ archive of health reports and radical newsletters is peppered with songs and drawings, complete with an entire teatro frontera booklet. Throughout her life, Reynolds combined art, music, and writing to stand up for social change.
Emily Martinez “My parents are the ones who taught me what I know.”

Emily Martinez was born in Texas in 1939, and moved to Blissfield, Michigan as a child. The oldest of ten children, Martinez came from a family with a long history of working as migrant farmers. Although her grandparents and parents grew up following the crop from La Feria, Texas to northern Michigan, Martinez’s parents ultimately settled in Blissfield in 1948 to raise their family. In transitioning from being migrant farmworkers to seasonal workers, Martinez’s family experienced racial discrimination in school, in attempting to purchase a home in a white neighborhood, and at work.
Elena Herrada “I really wanted to have a better understanding of the people that I had grown up around and the systems that I had seen oppress people.”

Elena Herrada was born on March 28, 1957 in Detroit, Michigan. She attended Wayne State University in Detroit, becoming involved with activism and Chicano Boricua studies. She graduated in 1980 with a degree in Criminal Justice and a major in Chicano Boricua Studies. Her motivation to graduate partially stemmed from her grandfather, who attended her graduation wearing full revolutionary regalia, shouting, “Viva Herrada!”
Jane Garcia "I had a choice in becoming politically active in one party or another, and I chose this. I had no choice in the rest of the stuff in my life, but I had a choice here."

Jane Garcia was born in Detroit, Michigan in 1948. She attended public and parochial schools, and is a graduate of Wayne State Community College. She is a licensed social worker, a former cosmetologist, and a constant advocate for positive social change in Detroit. Garcia has spent decades working for the United States Bureau of the Census, focusing on the Midwestern Hispanic population.
Cecilia Burciaga "There is history, it didn’t just appear when you appeared. But maybe that’s what my generation is about, we are the reganionas."

Cecilia has a BA in Teaching Credential from California State University – Fullerton and a Master’s Degree in Policy Studies in Higher Education from the University of California – Riverside. Some doctoral course work was complelted at the University of La Verne.

After moving to Washington, D.C., in year, Cecilia became a Foreign Service Intern for the U.S. Information Agency and a Program Officer for the Interagency Committee on Mexican-American Affairs. She also worked a Commissioner for the US Commission On Civil Rights, and as a teacher in the Chino School District.
Carmen Tafolla “The arts were crucial. They woke us up and they spoke to our hearts and they’re the true revolution.”

Carmen Tafolla was born in San Antonio, Texas on July 29, 1951 to a family with a history in San Antonio going back to the early eighteenth century. A resident of the West Side Barrio of the city, Carmen had a happy childhood immersed in Mexican American culture but was also keenly aware of the discrimination and injustice that those in her neighborhood faced. As part of a long history of neglect by the city, her neighborhood had a severe lack of books and literature, and Carmen was extremely eager to get her hands on anything and everything that she could read.
Maria Anita Guadiana "Nobody knew that there was any difference among each other. We all lived in the same neighborhood, we all lived at the same level of poverty."

Currently a social worker in the Cesar Chavez Academy High School in Detroit, Michigan, Maria Anita Guadiana’s involvement with activism and social justice started young with the help of her father, Jose Guadiana. Born in May 8th, 1948, she was the only daughter to Jose Guadiana and Maria Guadiana who had four boys before Guadiana was born.