Faith and Power

OPTalksBookspodcast
Written By Open Plaza

Dr. Jorge Juan Rodríguez V talks to Dr. Maggie Elmore, Dr. Sergio M. González, and Dr. Felipe Hinojosa about their edited volume on how religion has shaped Latino politics and community building since 1945

Católicos Por La Raza: A nun speaks to protesters in front of the California State Building in downtown Los Angeles at an immigration march against the Dixon-Arnett Act, which sought to fine employers who hired undocumented workers, 22 January 1972. © Pedro Arias. From the La Raza Photograph Collection (#1000). Courtesy of the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center.

 

Too often religious politics are considered peripheral to social movements, not central to them. Faith and Power: Latino Religious Politics Since 1945 (NYU Press, 2022) seeks to correct this misinterpretation, focusing on the post–World War II era. The edited volume shows that the religious politics of this period were central to secular community-building and resistance efforts. In this episode of OP Talks, Dr. Jorge Juan Rodríguez V talks to Dr. Maggie Elmore, Dr. Sergio M. González, and Dr. Felipe Hinojosa, editors of the volume. Faith and Power traces the interplay between Latino religions and a variety of pivotal movements, from the farm worker movement to the sanctuary movement, offering breadth and nuance to this history.

 
 
 

"Historians of Latinx politics have typically downplayed the importance of religion, and studies of Latinx religion have tended to focus on spirituality, belief, and cultural expression, while ignoring politics. Featuring an extraordinary lineup of scholars—including some of the top influential Latinx historians—Faith and Power is an impressive resource for understanding Latinx religious politics."

Geraldo Cadava
Author, The Hispanic Republican: The Shaping of an American Political Identity, from Nixon to Trump

 
Featured
Maggie Elmore

Dr. Maggie Elmore is an assistant professor of history in the Department of History at Sam Houston State University. A historian of the 20th century United States, she specializes in immigration, religion and politics, and human rights. Dr. Elmore holds BA and MA degrees from Texas Tech University, and a PhD from University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Elmore is currently the 2021-2022 Clements Fellow for the Study of Southwestern America at Southern Methodist University. Her current project, Torn Soul: The American Catholic Church and Mexican Immigrants, tells the story of the Catholic Church's fraught relationship with Mexican immigrants and its attempts to reshape U.S. immigration policy.

Featured
Sergio González

Dr. Sergio M. González is an assistant professor of Latinx Studies in the Departments of History and Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at Marquette University. As a historian of twentieth-century U.S. immigration, labor, and religion, his scholarship focuses on the development of Latino communities in the U.S. Midwest. His first book Mexicans in Wisconsin (Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2017) offers a concise introductory history of Mexican settlement and community formation across the state. His current project Strangers No Longer: Latino Belonging and Faith in 20th Century Wisconsin explores the relationship between Latino communities, religion, and social justice movements in twentieth-century Wisconsin. Dr. González has bridged his academic scholarship to broader audiences by serving as a founder of the Dane Sanctuary Coalition, as well as serving on the board of Voces de la Frontera, Wisconsin’s largest and most active membership-based immigrant justice organization.

Featured
Felipe Hinojosa

Born and raised in Brownsville, Texas, Dr. Felipe Hinojosa is the John and Nancy Jackson Endowed Chair in Latin America & Professor of History at Baylor University. Dr. Hinojosa was formerly on faculty at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas, where he also served as Director for the university's Carlos H. Cantu Hispanic Education & Opportunity Endowment. His research areas include Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies, American Religion, Race and Ethnicity, and Social Movements. He co-edited Faith & Power: Latino Religious Politics Since 1945 (New York University Press, 2022) with Sergio M. González and Maggie Elmore. His recent book, Apostles of Change: Latino Radical Politics, Church Occupations, and the Fight to Save the Barrio (University of Texas Press, 2021) is set in four major cities (Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, and Houston), where, in 1969 and 1970, Latino radical activists clashed with religious leaders as they occupied churches to protest urban renewal, poverty, police brutality, and racism. Latino Mennonites: Civil Rights, Faith, and Evangelical Culture (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014) received the 2015 Américo Paredes Book Award for the best book in Mexican American and Latina/o Studies by the Center for Mexican American Studies at South Texas College. His work has appeared in Zócalo Public Square, Western Historical Quarterly, American Catholic Studies, Mennonite Quarterly Review, and Latina/o Studies collections. Dr. Hinojosa holds a PhD in History from the University of Houston, an MA in History from the University of Texas Pan American, and BA in English from Fresno Pacific University. He serves on the Advisory Board for the interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed, and online moderated forum Latinx Talk.

Featured
Jorge Juan Rodríguez V

Dr. Jorge Juan Rodríguez V, the son of two Puerto Rican migrants, grew up with his parents, grandmother, and uncle in a small affordable housing community in urban Connecticut. His story of diaspora, translanguaging, race, and religion propelled his academic journey, leading him to degrees in biblical studies, social theory, liberation theologies, and a PhD in History from Union Theological Seminary. His scholarship examines the intersections of race, religion, and social movements with a particular focus on Black and Brown religious activism in the 20th century, including groups like the New York Young Lords. Dr. Rodríguez is an administrator and educator. In addition to his role as Visiting Assistant Professor of Historical Studies at Union Theological Seminary, he serves full-time as the Associate Director for Strategic Programming at the Hispanic Summer Program, a nonprofit that creates year-round educational spaces for Latinx graduate students of religion. Additionally, Dr. Rodríguez frequently consults with universities and organizations across the country to help them imagine and build more just economic, curricular, and labor systems in their institutions. Learn more about his work at www.jjrodriguezv.com and follow him on Twitter at @jjrodv.

 
Open Plaza
Previous

Cultivating Talent
Next

Thinking from Latin America