An Evening with Award-Winning Journalist & Political Commentator Rosa Alicia Clemente

The 2024 Ramona Arreguin de Rosales Lecture presented by the Department of Chicano and Latino Studies

Introduced by Minnesota State Rep. María Isa Pérez-Vega

Rosa Alicia Clemente Presents: Can’t Stop Our Blackness: Black Latinx Narratives and Resisting Erasure

More than ninety percent of enslaved Africans landed in what is today known as Latin America and the Caribbean via the transatlantic slave trade. The presence of our ancestors is still felt and maintained throughout these regions, including in the United States. Black Latinx/African descendants and people(s) are part of the broader Black community’s cultural and historical landscape in the U.S. Contemporary migration patterns of Afro-descended people throughout the Americas have created complex and diverse definitions of Blackness. Through the lens of hip hop, social justice, and Black and Brown freedom struggles, Clemente will discuss these diverse and complex experiences in an effort to illuminate intersections and findings about the experiences of people throughout the African Diaspora. Engaging with various topics and geographic locations to center Black Latinx and African descendant voices in service of providing historical context and contemporary realities about race, representation, and power within the U.S., Clemente, a voice of the hip hop generation, will draw from thirty years of movement building, third-party electoral politics, and independent journalism, weaving in her personal narrative with the histories and experiences of ancestors, elders, contemporaries, peers, and future generations.

6:30 p.m. Event with Live Bomba!

7:45 p.m. Reception — plus giveaways featuring department swag and local art!

Cosponsored by the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Minnesota.

About Rosa Alicia Clemente 

Rosa Alicia Clemente is an award-winning organizer, speaker, political commentator, producer, independent journalist, scholar-activist, and former vice-presidential candidate. A leading voice of her generation, the Bronx-born Black-Puerto Rican is frequently sought out for her insight and commentary on Afro-Latinx identity, Black and Latinx liberation movements, police violence, colonialism in Puerto Rico, hip-hop feminism, third-party politics, and more. In 2008, Clemente made herstory when she became the first Afro-Latina to run for vice president of the United States on the Green Party ticket. She and her running mate, Cynthia McKinney, are to this date the only women of color ticket in United States presidential history. Since then, Clemente has continued to be a powerhouse. She is the creator of Know Thy Self Productions, under which she has organized multiple national tours; PR on the Map, an independent, unapologetic, Afro-Latinx-centered media collective founded in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria; and the Black Diasporic Organizing Project, a nonprofit dedicated to combating anti-Blackness within the wider Latinx community. Recently, she was also associate producer on the 2021 Oscar-winning biographical drama film Judas and the Black Messiah. She is currently completing her PhD at the W.E.B. DuBois Center at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

About Rep. María Isa Pérez-Vega

Rep. María Isa Pérez-Vega serves as the Minnesota State Representative for District 65B, which includes parts of Saint Paul and West St. Paul. She is a member of the Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (DFL). Representative Pérez-Vega is a dedicated community organizer, international recording artist, and youth worker. Born and raised on the West Side of Saint Paul, she has devoted her career to cultural advocacy and youth empowerment. She directs the mentorship program for the Twin Cities Mobile Jazz Project and serves on the Capitol Area Architectural and Planning Board Public Engagement Advisory Task Force. As a type 1 diabetic, she has been an active leader in the fight for affordable healthcare, playing a significant role in the passage of the Alec Smith Insulin Affordability Act. She continues her advocacy within the Minnesota #Insulin4all Chapter. In recognition of her efforts with Youthrive Live!, she received the National Hispana Leadership Institute’s “Rising Latina Star" award. Additionally, she authored the historic Driver Licenses for All bill, which is now law, ensuring that all Minnesotans, regardless of immigration status, have access to driver's licenses.

About the Ramona Arreguín de Rosales Lecture Series

This lecture series honors Ramona Arreguín de Rosales, who helped lead the creation of the Department of Chicano & Latino Studies as a student more than 50 years ago. This fund supports an annual lecture by a scholar in the field of Chicana/o/x and Latina/o/x Studies.

Make a Gift to the Ramona Arreguín de Rosales Lecture Series Fund

UMN Conversations at Northrop is a collection of lectures, panel discussions, and other conversations focused on important and timely issues presented in collaboration among numerous University of Minnesota departments and held at Northrop.