Melinda González

Melinda Gonzalez’s research examines the lived experiences of hurricane Maria survivors in Puerto Rico and New York through the use of digital space, poetry, and community organizing, and also examines racial disparities in the ongoing water crisis in urban centers of the United States. She earned her Ph.D. in geography and anthropology from Louisiana State University.

Publications:

• March 2020. “Mitigating Disaster in Digital Space: DiaspoRicans Organizing after Hurricane Maria.” International Journal of Mass Emergencies and Disasters. Living with Hurricanes Special Issue.
• August 2019. “Methods of Motherhood: The Borderlands of Scholarship, Motherhood, and Trauma.” Curated blog series on Trauma and Resilience in Ethnographic Fieldwork for Anthrodendum.
• July 2019. “Converting Data to Scholarship with MAXQDA 2018.” #ResearchforChange Blog Series. (https://www.maxqda.com/fieldwork-to-conferences)

Media Appearances/Speaking Engagements:

• June 2021. Methods of Motherhood: Scholarship at the Borderlands of Student and Mother. Paper presented at Patchwork Ethnography webinar.
• March 2021. Making Home Betwixt Maria, Earthquakes and COVID-19: Confronting UnEnding Disaster in the Puerto Rican Diaspora. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology.
• November 2020. Life in the Spaces Between Maria, Earthquakes and COVID-19: Puerto Ricanness and UnEnding Disaster. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association. Cancelled due to COVID-19.

Previous Organizations: 

• Louisiana State University

Accomplishments:

• Mary Fran Myer’s Gender and Disaster Award, The Natural Hazards Center
• 2020-2021 American Dissertation Writing Fellowship, AAUW
• Louisiana State University Fellowship

Upcoming Projects

• Rahder, M., and M. Gonzalez. (Article manuscript in preparation). “Ethnography that Hurts: a Dialogue on Embodiment, Disability, and Feminist Collaborative Methods in Environmental Anthropology.” Intended for submission to Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society.
• “Maria’s Forgotten: Puerto Rican Evacuees & Refugees in New York.” Intended for Submission to the Centro Journal of Puerto Rican Studies.