Carolina Ramirez Moreno is a first year Ph.D. student in the department of Literature with an emphasis in Spanish and a Eugene Cota-Robles Fellow at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). In June of 2021, she completed her Bachelors of Arts in Spanish, Portuguese and Chicana/o Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).

As an undergraduate, Carolina participated in the UCSB’s McNair Scholars Program and was part of the College of Letters of Science Honors Program. Under the supervision of Dr. Ben V. Olguin, she completed her honors thesis titled “La Diva del Bronx: Scopophilia, Counter-Gazes, and Feminist Latinidades in the Artistic Career of Jennifer Lopez” (2021) which challenged Latinidad and the representation of female empowerment in the United States. Her academic interests focused on Latinidad, popular culture, the waves of feminism and the representation of women of color through scopophilia or the heterosexual white male gaze, the tropicalization of Latinas in US media and the representation of historical contexts through art and performance. After virtually presenting her thesis at the 2020 UCSB’s McNair Research Symposium, the 2020 UCLA’s National McNair Scholars Conference, and the 2021 John Hopkins University’s Second Annual Richard Macksey National Undergraduate Humanities Research Symposium, it was published in the Richard Macksey Journal at John Hopkins.  

Considering Carolina’s current proximity to the US/Mexico border, her research interests include methods and theory in border studies. Carolina plans to research how Mexican and Central American immigrants, especially women and youth,  articulate both unique and overlapping stories to reclaim their rights as human beings as part of a post-national, immanently utopian worlding constructed through but also beyond the oftentimes dystopic dimensions of migration and immigrant labor realities. Carolina wants to incorporate mixed-methods research, including oral historiography as well as text-based and archive-based literary and cultural studies. 

Lastly, Carolina is currently a Graduate mentor for the McNair Scholars program at both UCSB and UCSD. Her dedication to the mentorship of first generation and minority students is important for her identity as a Mexican American and migrant student. Equally, this volunteer service helps her to become a role model to younger generations interested in higher education  and get involved with members of communities of color.