Teaching In/Between: Curating Educational Spaces with autohistoria-teorيa and conocimiento

Teaching In/Between: Curating educational spaces with autohistoria-teorيa and conocimiento is an iteration of an educators embodied teaching and theorizing through testimonio work. Sotomayor, through a decolonizing feminist teaching inquiry, documents and analyzes her experiences as a facilitator in higher education while teaching the undergraduate course Latina Feminisms, Latinas in the US: Gender, Culture and Society.

This unique book is her interpretation and implementation of the seven recursive stages of Gloria Anzaldْas conocimiento theory as transformative acts to guide her research design and teaching approach. Sotomayors distinct bridging of Anzaldْas theories of autohistoria-teorيa and conocimiento offers an expansive perspective to how theorizing and curating our lived experiences can be transformational processes within academia. Sotomayor applies Anzaldْas theories and her own theorizing to curate educational spaces that decolonize White hegemonic academic canons and empower underrepresented learners who may experience a deep sense of not belonging in academia. She situates herself in the study as curator, and her practice as curator as an agent of self-knowledge production and theorizing to create self-empowering learning environments.

Sotomayors work dwells within the lineage of border and cultural studies with shared voices of Gloria Anzaldْa, AnaLouise Keating, Mariana Ortega, Ami Kantawala, Maxine Greene, and Ruth Behar. Her work is considered a guide for teaching practitioners and researchers who hope to develop ways of knowing within their teaching environments that are inclusive and holistic for learners through a non-linear transformative process. Teaching In/Between can be adapted for classroom use for pre-service teachers and instructors as well as creative interpretations for interdisciplinary works within Chicana/x, Latina/x, Art Education, Visual Arts and History, Womens & Gender Studies, Border and Cultural Studies.