Dr. Patricia Herrera
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Profile
Dr. Patricia Herrera is a community-engaged educator, scholar, and artist who believe in the transformative power of the arts to cultivate sanctuaries of love, hope, justice, and liberation. She is the author of Nuyorican Feminist Performances: From the Café to Hip Hop Theater (University of Michigan Press) and co-editor of Sounds Acts, Part 1 & 2. Since 2011, Patricia has been documenting Richmond, Virginia’s multifaceted history, working closely with local communities through her Civil Rights and Education in Richmond, Virginia: A Documentary Theater Project. This initiative birthed The Fight for Knowledge, a digital archive that brings to light the city’s ongoing struggle for equity and justice.
Driven by deep respect for the untold stories of Richmond’s people, Patricia has co-created three community exhibitions at The Valentine Museum, including Made in Church Hill (2015), Nuestras Historias: Latinos in Richmond (2017), and Voices from Richmond’s Hidden Epidemic (2019-2020) as well as Through it All: Families Moving Richmond (2021) at GRTC’s Transit Museum. She has also co-developed a series of seven docudramas addressing critical issues like gentrification, educational disparities, HIV/AIDS, segregation and Latinos in Richmond. Her scholarly works appear in Theatre History, Performance Matters, Theatre Topics, Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies, African American Review, Chicana/Latina Studies: The Journal of MALCS, and Public: A Journal of Imagining America, among others.
As a dramaturg, she has midwifed several creative projects, including the mixed-media installation project Entre Puerto Rico y Richmond: Bridging Histories of Resistance (2021), the dance performances Through It All (2022) and We Must Say Her Name (2019) and plays such as How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents (2020), and Blues for Mister Charlie (2018). She has also assisted with the development of original plays such as Threshold (2014), My Life is a Telenovela (2004), and Through My Eyes (1999). Her plays A Woman Who Outshone the Sun (2003), Embrace Me with Your Shawl (1997), and the musical Remnants (2014), co-written with José Joaquín Garcia, deal with growing up in New York City, environmental justice, and urban youth experiences. They have appeared at the Brooklyn Arts Exchange, International Fringe Festival, Rubicon Theatre Company, University of Richmond and Culver Center of the Arts.
She was the co-founder and co-director of Rubí Theater Company, an intergenerational ensemble that produced original plays and conducted performance workshops in New York City. She has appeared with the group as a lyricist and rapper on Dan Zanes’s Nueva York (2008), Catch That Train (2006 Grammy Award Winning CD for Best Children’s Musical Album), House Party (2003), and Night Time (2002).
She serves as Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging in the School of Arts and Sciences. She is a Professor of Theater affiliated with American Studies and Women, Gender, and Sexualities Studies programs at the University of Richmond. To learn more, check out her website: https://www.drpatriciaherrera.com
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Grants and Fellowships
Selected Grants and Fellowships
Virginia Humanities Foundation, Through It All, January 2022.
The Associated Colleges of the South, Participatory History and Archiving: An Initiative to Promote and Support Undergraduate Instruction and Project Outcomes in Community-Based Research and Archiving, Through It All, Centre College, Rollins College, Washington and Lee University, and Sewanee: The University of The South, the project lea, September 2021.
Virginia Humanities Foundation, Voices from Richmond’s Hidden Epidemic, The Valentine, Exhibition Sponsor, June 2019.
Richmond Memorial Health Foundation, Voices from Richmond’s Hidden Epidemic, The Valentine, Exhibition Sponsor, June 2019.
New York Public Library Short Term Fellowship Program, May 2017.
Yale Mellon Mid-Career Fellowship, Whitney Humanities Center, Alternate, February 2016.
National Endowment for the Humanities Grant, Latino Americans: 500 Years of History! June 2015-May 2016.
UR School of Arts and Science, Bonner Center for Civic Engagement, Community-Engaged Research and Practice Initiative Fellowship, March 2014.
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Awards
Collaborative Research Award, American Society for Theatre Research, November 2019.
Collaboration for Change Award, Bonner Center for Civic Engagement, September 2018.
University of Richmond Distinguished Educator, August 2018.
Faculty Award for Outstanding Citizenship with International Education, School of International Education, April 2017.
National Center for Institutional Diversity Exemplary Scholar, University of Michigan, 2009.
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Presentations
“Healing Offerings: The Work of Debora Kuetzpal Vasquez in Cuba,” Gender-Based Violence: Community-Building and Resistance Through Feminist Pedagogical and Artistic Practices, National Women's Studies Association, San Francisco, CA, November 2019.
“A Latinx Testimonio of Motherhood in Academia,” Women of Color Academics: Bravery, Vulnerability, and Resistance, National Women's Studies Association, San Francisco, CA, November 2019.
“Performando un activism feminist: El trabajo de Debora Kuetzpal Vasquez en La Marca,” with Mariela Méndez, Mujeres ambiente en la historia y la cultura latinoamericanas y caribeñas, Coloquio internacional de mujeres, Casas de las Américas, Habana, Cuba, February 2019.
“Listening to Sonic Subalterity: Sonic Labor in Lin Manuel-Miranda’s In the Heights,” Emergent Auralities: Subaltern Sounds in Latinx Cultural Production and Performance, American Studies Association, Atlanta, Georgia, November 2018.
“Productive Failures: Lessons with Community Based Projects,” Radical Inclusion Two: A Continuing Discussion Offering Tactics for Creative Learning Spaces for Engaging with Race, Association of Theatre in Higher Education, Boston, Massachusetts, August 2018.
“Sonic Treatise of Race in America: The Case of Universes and Lin Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton, Sound and Performance, Modern Language Association, New York City, January 2018.
“Sounding Out Radicalism,” The Transtemporalities of Minoritarian Performance, American Society for Theatre Research, Atlanta, Georgia, November 2017.
“Listening to Sonic Coalition: Virginia Repertory’s In the Heights, Staging Latinx Musicals in the Post-Hamilton Era, Association of Theatre in Higher Education, Las Vegas, Nevada, August 2017.
“Sounding Out the Radical Past in Universes’ Party People, The Transtemporalities of Minoritarian Performance, Indiana University, May 2017.
“Listening Critically to In the Heights Pan-Latinidad,” Sounding Latinidades: Race, Cultural Citizenship, and In the Heights, The 3rd Biennial U.S. Latina/o Literary Theory and Criticism Conference, Latinx Lives, Matters, and Imaginaries: Theorizing Race in the 21st Century, John Jay College of Criminal Justice at the City University of New York, New York City, April 2017.
“Sonic Utopias & Dystopias: The Unraveling of the Racial Past, Present, and Future in Hamilton,” American Society for Theatre Research, Minneapolis, Minnesota, November 2017.
“Sonic Hauntings of Blackness and Latinidad in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton, Hamilton: The Development, Casting, and Performance of a New American Musical, Association of Theatre in Higher Education, Chicago, Illinois, August 2016.
“Sonic Latinidades: Carefully Listening to Latina/o Theatre,” Sonic (In)Civilities in Latin@ Theater and Performance, Latina/o Studies Association, Pasadena, California, July 2016.
“Staging Nuyorican Belonging: From Feminist Cultural Productions to Hip Hop Theatre,” Beyond the Logic of Debt, Toward an Ethic of Collective Dissent, American Studies Association, Washington, D.C., November 2013.
“Performing Belonging: Culture Clash’s Nuyorican Stories,” (Re)Positioning the Latina/o Americas: Theatrical Histories and Cartographies of Power, American Society for Theatre Research, Dallas, Texas, November 2013.
“Performing the Archives: A 1968 Laboratory,” with Laura Browder and Benjamin Thorp, A Call to Action, Imagining America National Conference, Syracuse, New York, October 2013.
“Jamming Against Institutional Violence: The Works of Sandra Maria Esteves and Migdalia Cruz,” Aesthetic Dimensions of the Puerto Rican Diaspora: Institutional Violence, Sexuality, and Public Culture, American Studies Association, San Juan, Puerto Rico, November 2012.
“Aural Imaginary and Genealogy of Performances: Creating Oral Histories of the Founding Mothers of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe,” “Hear/Say”: Aural and Oral Histories of Theatre and Performance, American Society for Theatre Research, Nashville, Tennessee, November 2012.
2012 Re-mix, Re-use, Re-frame: Strategies for Teaching Hip Hop Theatre and Teaching Theatre with Hip Hop, Association of Theatre in Higher Education, Washington, D.C., August.
2012 Panel Discussant, “Global Hip Hop,” Digital Scholarship and Transnational American Studies, Tocqueville Conference, University of Richmond, May.
“Divisions and Intersections: Rethinking Latina/o and Latin American Theatre,” Power and Performance: Staging Politics in the Latina/o Americas, Association of Theatre in Higher Education, Latina/o Focus Group Pre-Conference, Washington, D.C., August 2012.
Respondent for the book Neoliberalism and Global Theatres: Performance Permutations, Spotlight on New Works in American Theatre, Association of Theatre in Higher Education, Washington, D.C., August 2012.
“Creating a Semester Plan,” Striking a Balance Between Work and Life, 2012 Virginia Network Conference 4th Women of Color Conference, Richmond, Virginia, June 2012.
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Designations
Co-chair, Institutional Council for Thriving, Inclusion, Diversity and Equity, Office of the President, July 2019-Present
Vice President for Awards, American Society for Theatre Research, November 2017-November 2020
Advisory Board Member of Chicana/Latina Studies: the Journal of Mujeres Activas en Letras Cambio Social (MALCS)
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Memberships
Advisory Board Member of Chicana/Latina Studies: the Journal of Mujeres Activas en Letras Cambio Social (MALCS)
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Grants and Fellowships
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Selected Publications
Books
Nuyorican Feminist Performance: From the Café to Hip Hop Theater, University of Michigan Press, May 2020.
Journal Articles“Performando un Activismo Feminista: El trabajo de Debora Kuetzpal Vasquez en La Marca,” Casas de la Américas: Revista Conjunto 192-193 (julio-diciembre 2019): 53-57.
“¡Oye, Oye!: A Manifesto for Listening to Chicanx/Latinx Theater,” Co-authored with Marci McMahon, Dossier on Chicanx/Latinx Teatro, ed. Brian Herrera, Aztlán: A Journal of Chicana/o Studies 44.1: 239-248.
“Building Latinidad, Silencing Queerness: Culture,” Theatre Topic 27.1, Special Issue of Latino Theatre & Performance, March 2017.
Herrera, Patricia. "Hamilton, Democracy, and Theatre in America." HowlRound: A Knowledge Commons by and for the Theatre Community (Pedagogy Notebook Blog). May 16, 2016.
"An Archive, Public Participation, and a Performance: Five Perspectives,” Public: A Journal of Imagining America, October 2013.
“She Wears the Masks: Bluefacing in Nilaja Sun’s Black and Blue and La Nubia Latina,” African American Review, September 2013.
“Civil Rights and Education in Richmond, Virginia: A Documentary Theater Project,” The Journal of Inclusive Scholarship and Pedagogy, 23.1 (Summer 2012), 15-35.
"Performance Review: Power to the Panza!: Feminist Body Politics in the Panza Monologues,” Chicana/Latino Studies: The Journal of Mujeres Activas en Letras y Cambio Social 10.2 (June 2011), 206-211.
"Minotaur or The King's Bull," Performance Review, Theatre Journal, March 2000.
Book Chapters“A Latinx Testimonio of Motherhood in Academia,” eds. M. C. Whitaker & E. A. Grollman, Counternarratives from Women of Color Academics: Bravery, Vulnerability, and Resistance, New York: Routledge, 137-45, 2018.
“Waking up from Utopia: Reckoning with America’s Racial Past, Present, and Future in Hamilton,” Historians on Hamilton: How a Blockbuster Musical is Restaging America’s Past, eds. Renee C. Romano & Claire Bond Potters, Rutgers University, 2018.
“Listening to Afrolatinidad: The Sonic Archives of Olú Clemente,” book chapter, Afro-Latinos in Movement: Critical Approaches to Blackness and Transnationalism in the Americas, Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.
Herrera, Patricia. "Listening to Afro-Latinidad: The Sonic Archive of Olú Clemente." In Afro-Latin@s in movement : critical approaches to blackness and transnationalism in the Americas, by Petra R Rivera-Rideau, Jennifer A Jones, and Tianna S Paschel. 171-94. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2016.
"Guambra, Fiera, Karichina: The Pedagogy of Redefining Latina Health," An Anthology in Chicana/Latina Epistemology, eds. Dolores Delgado Bernal, C. Alejandra Elenes, Francisca E Godinez, and Sofia Villenas, State University of New York Press, 2006. The book was awarded the AESA Critics' Choice Award 2006.
Selected Community-Engaged Scholarship
Museum Exhibit
Co-curator and Oral Historian, Voices from Richmond’s Epidemic, The Valentine Museum, January 2020-May 2021.Co-curator, Hope, Faith, and Courage: Early Civil Rights Leaders in Richmond, University of Richmond Downtown, February-July 2019.
Oral Historian, Nuestras Historias: Latinos in Richmond, Valentine Museum, July 27-April 15 2017.
Oral Historian, Made in Church Hill, in collaboration with Laura Browder, Michael Lease, Traci Garland, Vaughn Garland, and our students at UR and VCU, Valentine Museum, January 22-June 28 2015.
Devised Performances
Dramaturg & Co-director, “Knowledge of This Cannot be Hidden”: Westham Burying Ground Commemorative Act at the University of Richmond,” video project, produce by DoubleTake, May 2020.Co-organizer & Co-producer, Feminist Flash Mob at the University of Richmond, adapted from LasTesis’s performance-based protest “Un violador en su camino,” and performed by students in “Gender, Race and Performance Across the Americas” co-taught with Mariela Méndez along with five other classes, March 4, 2020.
Dramaturg & Co-director, Performance of Voices from Richmond’s Hidden Epidemic with Laura Browder, written by students in “The AIDS Epidemic in Richmond,” Richmond Triangle Players, Richmond, Virginia, November 24, 2019.
Dramaturg & Co-director, Performance of Civil Rights Richmond: Then and Now with Laura Browder, written by students in “Growing Up Civil Rights Richmond: Documentary Theater Project,” Modlin Center for the Arts, Harnett Museum of Art, April 9, 2019.
Dramaturg & Co-director, Performance of RVAIDS with Laura Browder, written by students in “The AIDS Epidemic in Richmond,” Richmond Triangle Players, Richmond, Virginia, December 1, 2018.
Dramaturg & Co-director, Encore Performance of The Spirit of Armstrong with Laura Browder, written by students in “Documenting a Black Historic High School: A Richmond Community Project” in collaboration with students from the Armstrong Leadership Program and Armstrong Alums, Armstrong High School, Richmond, Virginia, April 19, 2017.
Dramaturg & Co-director, The Spirit of Armstrong with Laura Browder, written by students in “Documenting a Black Historic High School: A Richmond Community Project” in collaboration with students from the Armstrong Leadership Program and Armstrong Alums, Armstrong High School, Richmond, Virginia, December 4, 2017.
Dramaturg & Co-director, Church Hill: A Changing Neighborhood with Laura Browder, written by students in “Documenting A Changing Neighborhood: A Richmond Community Project” in collaboration with students from the Armstrong Leadership Program, Armstrong High School, Richmond, Virginia, April 12, 2016.
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In the News
How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents Would Have Been the First Bilingual Play at UR
Fri., Apr. 17, 2020Feminist Flash Mobs See to Protest, Encourage Discussion
Thu., Mar. 19, 2020Association for Theatre in Higher Education Election Results
Roundtable Event Aims to Explore African Diaspora Through Song and Dance
Thu., Mar. 19, 2020Hundreds Gather for Community Meeting to Speak about Racism on Campus
Fri., Jan. 31, 2020The Valentine's Newest Exhibition Reveals Untold Stories From Richmond's AIDS Epidemic
Wed., Jan. 29, 2020Personality: Dr. Patricia Herrera
Fri., Jan. 24, 2020Voices from Richmond's Hidden Epidemic
Thu., Jan. 23, 2020Voices from Richmond's Hidden Epidemic Opens
Thu., Jan. 23, 2020Voices from Richmond's Hidden Epidemic Exhibition Puts Faces and Stories to HIV/AIDS Crisis
Tue., Jan. 21, 2020Love at Work: How a Church, Two Professors and HIV and AIDS Survivors Came Together to Form the Valentine's Upcoming Exhibit
Mon., Jan. 20, 2020Voices Carry: A New Exhibition Offers Perspective on HIV/AIDS in Richmond
Mon., Jan. 20, 2020UR Professor Wins National Award for Theatre Research
Wed., Jan. 1, 2020Collaborative Arts Lab Course Engages with Institutional History
Tue., Nov. 19, 2019Hamilton Leads the List of Must-Sees on the Autumn Stage
Mon., Sep. 23, 2019HIV in Richmond
Tue., Jul. 16, 2019Harvey on Romano and Potter, 'Historians on Hamilton: How a Blockbuster Musical is Restaging America's Past
Sun., Jul. 1, 2018Social Activism, Hamilton and Puerto Rico
Tue., Jun. 5, 2018The Issue on the Table: Is "Hamilton" Good for History?
Wed., May. 30, 2018Historians on Hamilton: How a Blockbuster Musical is Restaging America¿s Past
Thu., May. 24, 2018OAH Dispatch: Historians on "Hamilton"
Sat., Apr. 14, 2018Armstrong Isn't What It's Made Out to Be': Docudrama to Tell the Story of Richmond's Oldest Predominantly Black High School
Wed., Apr. 18, 2018Documenting a Historic Black High School UR Students wrote and performed a documentary drama about history of Armstrong High
Wed., Apr. 18, 2018The Valentine Explores the Diversity of the Latino Experience in Richmond
Tue., Aug. 1, 2017The Spirit of Armstrong
Fri., Dec. 1, 2017Road Trip in Search of America
Sun., Jan. 8, 2017Church Hill Meeting an Open Door to Dialogue
Thu., Apr. 14, 2016Students Explore Gentrification Through Documentary Drama
Thu., Apr. 7, 2016We Are Here
Sun., Mar. 13, 2016Latino Project Seeks to Move Richmond Beyond Black and White
Thu., Feb. 25, 2016Made in Church Hill: Curated by Community
Thu., Feb. 12, 2015Made in Church Hill Opens Thursday at The Valentine
Thu., Feb. 12, 2015Made in Church Hill Opens Thursday at The Valentine
Wed., Jan. 21, 2015Remnants Play Premieres at Modlin Center
Fri., Nov. 21, 2014Learning Curve: Four Years in the Making, a Hip-Hop Musical Surfaces at the University of Richmond
Tue., Nov. 18, 2014blu Highlights Cultural Commentary in Weekend Show
Thu., Oct. 11, 2012Documentary Theatre: Community-based Learning Course Focuses on Massive Resistance
Thu., Jul. 28, 2011Panelists Show How Art Brings Change
Thu., Sep. 9, 2010 - Links