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Marie Sarita Gaytán Assistant Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies |
EDUCATION
Ph.D. in Sociology, University of California, Santa Cruz, 2008
M.A. in Sociology, University of California, Santa Cruz, 2005
B.A. (with honors) in Political Science and Sociology, University of California, Irvine, 1997
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Sarita Gaytán's interests focus on race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, globalization, Latino/a studies, Latin America, culture, political economy, and environmental studies. Before joining the department, she taught at Lewis and Clark College, Bowdoin College and New York University, where she was a faculty fellow in Latino studies.
Her current project analyzes the conditions that influenced tequila's rise as Mexico's "spirit" from the colonial period to the present day. Drawing on research conducted in Mexico and the United States, she explores the complex political, economic, and cultural circumstances that solidified tequila's role in the national project. This work illustrates how commodities--in this case the multiple formulations of tequila's social life play an important role in the formation of gendered and racialized subjectivities both within and beyond the nation state.