Vania Barraza Toledo
Professor of Spanish
About
Vania Barraza is Professor of Spanish. Her research focuses on Latin American literature and culture,
with a particular emphasis on film, gender and sexuality studies. She is a member
of the Women's and Gender Studies Advisory Board, at the University of Memphis, a
council member of the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) Film Studies Section
(2017-2019 / 2019-2021), the organizer of the yearly Hispanic Film Festival, and advisor
of the Spanish Club. She is the author of El cine en Chile (2005-2015): Políticas
y poéticas del nuevo siglo (Cuarto Propio, 2018), (In)subordinadas: raza, clase y
filiación en la narrativa de mujeres latinoamericanas (RIL, 2010), co-editor with
Carl Fischer of Chilean Film in the Twenty-First Century World (Wayne State University
Press 2020), and guest editor for the Journal of Gender and Sexuality Studies, for
the Special Issue on Gender and Cinema (47.1: 2021). Her book El cine en Chile was
awarded the Harvey L. Johnson Publication Award 2020, granted by the Southwest Council
of Latin American Studies (SCOLAS). She is assistant editor for production for the
journal Letras Hispanas and has written more than 25 research articles on gender,
literature and cinema. She is currently studying the connection between gendered public
and private experiences and larger social and economic issues in contemporary Chile,
as reflected in recent Chilean filmmaking.