“Where Are ‘We’ in Transnational U.S. Latino/a Studies?”

Abstract

<p>The article considers various disciplinary, methodological, theoretical and ethical questions resulting from conducting transnational US Latino/a studies in practice. Drawing from research with a community of Latino prizefighters in Austin, Texas, it delineates academic discourses as spatially determined processes, demarcated by scholars’ institutional settings and individual agency in multiple geographic environments. The discussion suggests that being an ‘insider’ or ‘outsider’ is not a rigid condition but necessarily malleable, contingent upon a range of factors that shape up broader knowledge formation processes in and out of academia. In lieu of a nation-based research paradigm, the article calls for contestations of shifting scholarly loci—spatial between-ness—for important strategic purposes. Such mobility may effectively allow adopting viewpoints that are not necessarily available for those who operate within fixed disciplinary, methodological and intra-group boundaries, while providing scholars with innovative new approaches to conduct Latino/a studies research from de facto transnational and interdisciplinary perspectives.</p><p> </p><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>