Research
My current book project titled, Gendered Enclosures and Feminist Fugitivities in Latinx Los Angeles further unpacks how places constructed as geographies of suciedad are first devalued through criminalization (labeled as gang territories, drug markets, or prostitution zones) which justifies both police intervention and subsequent capital investment that displaces original residents (Vargas, 2014). Using transdisciplinary methods such as ethnography, interviews, and archival research, I weave together a unique methodology that challenges voyeurism and extractivism of researchers in academia. By writing about the neighborhoods that I navigated, and organizing work that I engage in I build on a rich legacy of women of color theorists that value embodied knowledge. This work emphasizes that cultural production within gentrifying landscapes refuses banishment by maintaining cultural memory, creating alternative economies of value, providing visual disruptions to whitewashing and establishes forms of placemaking that refuse displacement.