Congrats 2021 Firestarter Award Winner, Edith Cruz!

She challenges ideas around ethnicity/race, through honest conversations and personal narratives which focus on how she has been treated in educational institutions as an English as a Second Language (ESL) student and in interpersonal relationships. Her future episodes have a deeper focus on educational equity, culturally responsive curriculum and critical race theory. 

One nominator said, “One of my favorite pieces of Edith’s is a guest podcast she did for Sobre la Meza, where she told stories and interviewed a student about the concept of Ni de aqui, Ni de alla. ‘Nor here, nor there’, which speaks specifically to the idea that many immigrant young people feel of being between cultures. Edith discusses how bridging the space of both Mexican and American identities has allowed her to challenge stereotypes that many people have about what it means to be a young Mexican femme who has primarily grown up in Kentucky. She holds space for the complexities and contradictions that arise from being bicultural and how defining one’s self for yourself is deeply important to affirming that Mexican and Latinx identities are not and never were a monoculture.” 

The reviewers said, “Edith’s feminist artform is unique and takes great, great risks for social change. Edith’s ability to use her own experience to not only explore, but challenge the norm is brilliant.”   

Her art speaks to feminism as many of her works touch on the topics of defying Mexican/Latinx Stereotypes and challenging social expectations of each gender, such as the idea of a ‘perfect Mexican daughter’. “Her feminism is uniquely her own. As a young queer Latinx femme, she is continuing to grow and evolve in her perspective and approach to how she tells stories and whose stories need to be centered.” 

Edith takes her feminism beyond ideology. She serves as a mentor and instructor in the Latinx Leadership and College Experience Camp, where she serves as a Social Justice project instructor and teaches technical podcasting skills.   

She pushes for social change not only in her work but also in her life. Her nominator says, “She makes fires everywhere she goes, particularly in higher education where she works. She pushes her institution to not just rely on the rhetoric of inclusion and equity but to live out these principles in practice and policy. I know Edith will continue to use podcasting and storytelling to spark conversations, action and policy work not just in Kentucky, but nationally as she focuses on the experiences of immigrants, newly diasporic persons and refugees.” 

Her nominator reports that she is currently spearheading an effort to reimage and remix the seminal text, Borderlands/La Frontera by Gloria E. Anzaldúa. This will be a project that promotes education equity. By making literature content accessible for students who are bilingual or need access to reading materials in another format. She will be creating this project by adding audio components such as an audiobook to this literature content.

“Her reimaging of Borderlands/La Frontera is truly exciting and innovative, it will have far reaching resonance and be a bridge to discussing what borderlands exist in Kentucky and beyond.” 

Edith says she is very grateful for the nomination, and feels ready for the opportunities it might bring.