Citizenship

Born of Mexican parents in 1940 in Parral, Chihuahua, Juan Gómez-Quiñones has been active in the articulation and political negotiation of cultural citizenship since the 1960s. His experience in the United States' Chicano civil rights movement led to his authoring of foundational papers on the history and identity of Chicano peoples of the southwestern United States. Soon after, he expressed the importance of and developed an epistemology for Chicano studies as a new interdisciplinary field. Such efforts helped to establish Chicano studies in institutions of higher education throughout the nation. Among his published works are Chicano Politics: Reality and Promise, 1940–1990 (1990); Mexican American Labor, 1790–1990 (1994); and Roots of Chicano Politics, 1600–1940 (1994). In 1971 he helped found Aztlan: International Journal of Chicano Studies Research, the United States' premier journal of Chicana and Chicano studies. He is professor of history at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and lives with his family in Santa Monica, California. In 2003 UCLA presented him with the Rosenfield Distinguished Community Partnership Prize for community service.