S1E8: Christine Vega on Chicana Motherwork

Christine Vega is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Graduate School of Education & Information Studies (GSE&IS) Social Science and Comparative Education at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). She holds a Master of Education from the University of Utah's School of Education, Culture, and Society. Born and raised in Pacoima, she is proud mother-scholar-activist merging both academia, activism, and spirituality. During her pregnancy and the birth of her son, her research shifted towards Chicana Latina Ph.D. mother attrition and retention of maternal activism.  She is a founding mother of both Mothers of Color in Academia de UCLA and the Chicana M(other)work collective. Christine is an AAHHE and CDIP Fellow and has short stories, poetry and theoretical publications about birth, pregnancy, and ceremony in UCLA's Regeneracion Tlacuilolli and InterActions. She is currently on fellowship (DYF) completing her dissertation as a visiting community scholar at Denver University. She has worked as a GSR for the GSE&IS Equity and Diversity Committee and is a Teaching Associate for Cesar Chavez Department of Chicana/o Studies at UCLA. 

This particular podcast is the second of an interconnected set of conversations with female scholars of color exploring tensions in the context of a series of books recently published that examine race and gender in higher education.  Christine is co-editor of and contributor to the recently published book, The Chicana Motherwork Anthology:  Because Without Morthers, There is No Revolution.  The anthology weaves together emerging scholarship and testimonios by and about self-identified Chicana and Women of Color mother-scholars, activists, and allies who center mothering as transformative labor through an intersectional lens. Contributors provide narratives that make feminized labor visible and that prioritize collective action and holistic healing for mother-scholars of color, their children, and their communities within and outside academia.  Ms. Vega is also a Visiting Community Scholar here at DU.