Sonia Guiñansaca

Sonia Guiñansaca
Born1989
Cuenca, Ecuador
Alma materHunter College
GenrePoetry

Sonia Guiñansaca (born in Cuenca, Ecuador in 1989) is a migrant poet, cultural organizer and activist whose work aims for culture equality and social justice, focusing on migrant rights, climate change, LGBTQ+ rights, and gender discrimination.[1][2]

Background

Guiñansaca migrated from Ecuador to Harlem at the age of five to reunite with their parents, who were undocumented. After graduation (Hunter College with a BA in Africana Puerto Rican Latino Studies and Women and Gender Studies) with their background in organizing migrant undocumented communities, they determined that not only policy but art and culture play crucial roles to bring social changes.[3] Since 2013, they worked at Culture Strike as the managing director, an American organization with more than 200 artists of multiple disciplines working for a social change acknowledging and supporting queer, transgender, women, color, migrant emergent artists. In particular, they created the first writing workshops by and for undocumented writers, then co-created the first and only national writing retreat for undocumented writers called UndocuWriters Retreat.[4] In the spring of 2013, they created and helped launch Undocumenting.tmblr.com, a project highlighting the work of undocumented immigrants.[5] Guiñansaca has performed in many different places such as Museo del Barrio, Nuyorican Poets Café, NY Poetry Festival, The Met, Brooklyn Museum, London, Mexico, and featured in Latina Magazine, PBS, Poetry Foundation, etc. They also presented Keynotes, workshops and panels in different Universities.[6][7] In October 2017, they self-published their debut chapbook Nostalgia & Borders and is editing the first undocumented poetry anthology Home in Time of Displacement and currently working on a new chapbook #PapiFemme, which will focus on the central themes of gender and presentation, as well as the queer and immigrant communities.[8] They were named by Teen Vogue as one of the "13 Coolest Queers on the Internet."[9]

Works

  • Nostalgia & Borders, 2017. OCLC 994629327

References

  1. ^ Guerrero, Hanna (4 May 2016). "Immigrant Poet Sonia Guiñansaca: Nostalgia Of Home 'Never Goes Away'". NBC News.
  2. ^ Chen, Ken (1 September 2015). "The PEN Ten with Sonia Guiñansaca". PEN American Center.
  3. ^ Mustarde, Danielle (March 2018). "The future is Fierce". Diva. pp. 74–75. ProQuest 2009454644.
  4. ^ Soto, Christopher (2019-10-01). "Undocumented Poets and Writers Are Vital to the Struggle for Migrant Justice". The Nation. ISSN 0027-8378. Retrieved 2021-04-08.
  5. ^ "(Un)documenting".
  6. ^ Parrish, Oscar. ""Ubícate": (Im)Migration Week at Whitman". Whitman Wire. Retrieved 2021-04-08.
  7. ^ "Sonia Guiñansaca". dacaseminar.fas.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2021-04-08.
  8. ^ Barrett, Kay Ulanday (28 December 2018). "Sonia Guiñansaca: On the Migrant Arts Movement and the Power of Creating Chapbooks". Lambda Literary Foundation.
  9. ^ "The thirteen coolest queers on the internet that you need to follow ASAP". Teen Vogue. 6 June 2016. Retrieved 2019-03-02.