This working group reveals how Latina/o/x communities confront environmental injustices and adapt to extreme climate events. The three regions studied are: Chicago, Los Angeles, and the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. This project aims to create a collection of digital humanities archives centering the experiences and struggles of Latinx communities. This collection of public archives can enrich scholarly research, teaching, and public programming in the humanities. It will be a resource for those concerned with how climate change is rapidly and devastatingly affecting Latinx, Latin American, and Caribbean communities.
This endeavor contains five research projects under its umbrella:
• Disparate Disaster Impacts on Undocumented Migrants
• Chicago Latinx Voices on Environmental & Climate Change Racism
• Experiences of Slow Violence along the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal
• Crossing Humboldt Park and Puerto Rico
• Climate Justice, Sustainability, and the Informal City
Climate and Environmental Justice
Research Questions
How do low-income Latinx communities experience, adapt, and resist extreme climate events?
How does climate change increase/trigger the current inequities experienced by vulnerable
Latinx communities?What adaptation strategies have households and communities developed to improve their living
conditions and adapt to climate change challenges?What can academic researchers do to support these adaptation strategies?
Principal Investigators
Teresa Córdova, Director of the Great Cities Institute (GCI) and professor of Urban Planning and Policy at the University of Illinois at Chicago
Michael Méndez, Assistant professor of environmental policy and planning at the University of California, Irvine
Ariadna Reyes, Assistant Professor at the College of Architecture Public Affairs and Planning Department at the University of Texas at Arlington
Investigators
Rachel Havrelock, Professor in the Department of English at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Director of the UIC Freshwater Lab
Ralph Cintrón, Professor of English and Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago
Rosa M. Cabrera, Director of the Rafael Cintrón Ortiz Latino Cultural Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago
Fellows
Guadalupe Arellanes, Crossing Latinidades Research Fellow, 2022-2023, Ethnic Studies, University of California, Riverside
Josh Newton, Crossing Latinidades Research Fellow, 2022-2023, Urban Planning and Public Policy, University of Texas at Arlington
Frida Sanchez Vega, Crossing Latinidades Research Fellow, 2022-2023, English, University of Illinois at Chicago
