Chisme and its Cultural Importance

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Written By Open Plaza

Dr. Neomi De Anda, Dr. Jacqueline Hidalgo, and Dr. Matilde Moros dish on gossip

Image: “Powered by Chisme” coffee mug by Tony Avina on Etsy

Image: “Powered by Chisme” coffee mug by Tony Avina on Etsy

 
 

Chisme, bochinche, tea—whatever you call it, gossip has a cultural importance in our communities. Dr. Neomi De Anda, Dr. Jacqueline Hidalgo, and Dr. Matilde Moros dish on what Dr. De Anda describes as communication behavior that functions to “reveal what is missing in social systems or when someone steps outside the boundaries of social systems".

Further Reading

De Anda, Neomi. "Dame Chocolate: Images of God, Life and Gossip in Telenovelas". Journal of Hispanic/Latino Theology (2009).

Hidalgo, Jacqueline. “The Bible and Global-Systemic Criticism in the Age of ‘Fake News’.” Contribution to Roundtable on “Fake News vs. Good News: Texts, Tweets, and Technology,” Perspectivas 16 (2019): 105-110.

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Neomi De Anda

Dr. Neomi De Anda is Executive Director of International Marian Research Institute (IMRI) at the University of Dayton, where she served as a Human Rights Center Research Associate and is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies. She teaches courses in religion, languages and cultures, Latinx studies, race and ethnic studies, and women and gender studies.  Dr. De Anda holds a PhD in Constructive Theology from Loyola University Chicago, and Master’s degrees in Theology (Oblate School of Theology) and Educational Leadership (St. Mary’s University, San Antonio).  Her research interests include LatinoXa Christology; theology and breast milk; chisme; Marianist Catholic Higher Education; the intersection of race and migrations, in conjunction with the Marianist Social Justice Collaborative Immigrant Justice Team; and partnering with the Hope Border Institute on a border theology at the intersections of the environment, migrations, labor, and women. Dr. De Anda is the most recent past president for the Academy of Catholic Hispanic Theologians of the United States (ACHTUS). Her honors include: the 2021 University of Dayton University Award for Faculty Teaching; the 2021 University of Dayton College of Arts and Sciences Outstanding Service Award for faculty; recognition as a Courageous Woman's Voice at the University of Dayton (2020) and an outstanding faculty member in the State of Ohio by Ohio Magazine (2019). Dr. De Anda has also received various grants from the Hispanic Theological Initiative, the Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning in Religion and Theology, the Association of Marianist Universities, and the Louisville Institute, where she now serves as a member of the board. 

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Jacqueline Hidalgo

Dr. Jacqueline M. Hidalgo is Professor of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of San Diego. Formerly, she served as Professor of Latina/o/x Studies and of Religion; Associate Dean for Institutional Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; and Director of the Oakley Center for the Humanities and Social Sciences at Williams College. She is a past president of the Academy of Catholic Hispanic Theologians of the United States (ACHTUS) and Vice President of the New England/Eastern Canada Region of the Society of Biblical Literature. Dr. Hidalgo has written several essays that examine the intersections of gender, sexuality, ecology, Latine studies, and biblical studies. She is the author of Latina/o/x Studies and Biblical Studies in Brill Research Perspectives in Biblical Interpretation 3.4 (2020), as well as Revelation in Aztlán: Scriptures, Utopias, and the Chicano Movement (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016). With Efraín Agosto, she also co-edited the collection of essays Latinxs, the Bible, and Migration (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). Dr. Hidalgo holds an AB from Columbia University, an MA from Union Theological Seminary, and a PhD from Claremont Graduate University.

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Matilde Moros

Dr. Matilde Moros is Assistant Professor of Gender Sexuality and Women’s Studies at Virginia Commonwealth University. She is a theological social ethicist working in the field of gender, sexuality and women's studies. The ethics of resistance and subversion of hegemonic world-views and narratives of power lead her teaching and learning toward a counter-narrative method of decolonial, transnational feminist ethics. Feminist social ethics must respond to sexual and gender violence and the multiple intersections of which race and its various social constructions has led to the exclusion from centers of power of many peoples, including Latin-American and Latinx communities. Dr. Moros conducts research on the communal and historical effects of organized resistance to gendered and sexual violence has led her to an approach to liberation ethics in which recovery of resistance methods has become the primary focus.

 
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