Vanessa Díaz
Associate Professor of Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies | Loyola Marymount University
Los Angeles, CA, UNITED STATES
Bellarmine College of Liberal Arts
Media
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Biography
Dr. Vanessa Díaz is an interdisciplinary ethnographer, filmmaker, and journalist. Her research focuses on the ways race and gender impact labor markets and practices in the culture industries across the Americas. Díaz’s first book, Manufacturing Celebrity: How Latino Paparazzi and Women Reporters Build the Hollywood Industrial Complex, was published with Duke University Press (2020). Grounded in her experience as a red carpet reporter for People magazine, Manufacturing Celebrity focuses on hierarchies of labor as well as ethnoracial and gender politics in the production of celebrity-focused media. The research for Manufacturing Celebrity was supported by numerous grants and fellowships, including those from the Ford Foundation Fellows/National Academy of Sciences, the Smithsonian Institute, and the Historical Society of Southern California, among others. Díaz is also a co-author of UCLA’s 2017 Hollywood Diversity Report. She is currently collaboratively producing a documentary about the Latino paparazzi of Los Angeles entitled Pappin’ Ain’t Easy. In addition to her research on media and popular culture in the United States, she has also done extensive research on cultural production in the Caribbean and among its diasporas. In 2006, she completed her independent feature-length documentary Cuban HipHop: Desde el Principio (From the Beginning), which recounts the history of the Cuban HipHop movement while exploring how Afro-Cuban youth use HipHop to defy misconceptions about censorship in Cuba by delivering social critiques of racism and poverty on the island. Díaz is the co-creator of the Bad Bunny Syllabus Project, which seeks to educate the public on Bad Bunny's global impact & how it reflects political, artistic, and cultural triumphs and struggles within Puerto Rico. Díaz is called upon by publications ranging from The Atlantic, to the Los Angeles Times, to NPR to comment upon major events in popular culture. She is able to provide necessary context to understand how and why particular events capture the American popular imagination, while simultaneously revealing the hidden labor and racial struggles involved in the production of popular culture.
Education (3)
University of Michigan: Ph.D.
University of Michigan: M.A.
New York University: B.A.
Areas of Expertise (19)
Media & popular culture
race & racialization
Gender & Sexuality
Entertainment
Celebrity Culture
Puerto Rico
Bad Bunny
Caribbean
Cuba
Hollywood
United States
Latina/o/x identity
Nationalism
(im)migration
Labor & Employment
diasporas
political culture
Latin America
oral & life histories
Industry Expertise (10)
Writing and Editing
Print Media
Entertainment
Motion Pictures and Film
Media - Print
Media Production
Media - Online
Audio Visual
Music
Women
Accomplishments (15)
Association for Latina/o and Latinx Anthropologists Book Award
2022
Society for the Anthropology of Work Book Award
2022
Latin American Studies Association, Latinx Studies Section Book Award: Honorable Mention
2022
Historical Society of Southern California, Ahmanson Grant
2019
Dartmouth College César Chávez Postdoctoral Fellowship
2017-2018
Mellon Summer Institute on Tenure and Professional Advancement (SITPA) Scholar
2016-2018
Ford Foundation, Postdoctoral Fellowship
2016-2017
UCLA Institute of American Culture Visiting Researcher Program Award
2016-2017
UCLA Institute of American Cultures Research Grant in Ethnic Studies
2017
University of Michigan Louise Ann Williams Anthropology Distinguished Dissertation Award
2016
University of Michigan ProQuest Distinguished Dissertation Award, Anthropology Nominee
2015
American Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual Photo Contest Winner
2014
Ford Foundation, Dissertation Fellowship
2012-2013
Smithsonian Institute, Predoctoral Fellowship (National Museum of American History; National Portrait Gallery; Washington, D.C.)
2012-2013
Rackham Merit Fellowship, University of Michigan
2007-2014
Affiliations (10)
- Ford Foundation Fellowship Annual Conference Planning Committee Member and Former Chair
- Puerto Rican Studies Association
- American Anthropological Association
- New England Consortium of Latino Studies
- Association of Latina & Latino Anthropologists
- Latin American Studies Association
- Society for the Anthropology of North America
- National Association of Hispanic Journalists
- Latina/o Studies Association
- National Association of Latino Independent Producers
Links (3)
Languages (2)
- English
- Spanish
Media Appearances (13)
Bad Bunny Conquered the World, Now What?
Rolling Stone print
2023-07-01
Díaz is quoted in this Rolling Stone cover story.
Opinion: At Coachella, Bad Bunny stays true to himself
Los Angeles Times print
2023-04-21
Díaz is quoted in this opinion piece.
Al Punto with Jorge Ramos
Univision tv
2023-02-05
Díaz's course "Bad Bunny and Resistance in Puerto Rico" is the focus of this segment with acclaimed journalist Jorge Ramos.
Why Bad Bunny’s Un Verano Sin Ti is Such a Big Deal
Vox online
2023-02-04
Díaz is quoted in this piece on Bad Bunny's record-breaking album.
Bad Bunny Wins Best Música Urbana Album at the 65th Grammy Awards
NBC online
2023-02-03
Díaz quoted in this article about Bad Bunny's Grammy wins.
Bad Bunny, Reggaeton, and Resistance
National Public Radio (NPR) Codeswitch radio
2023-01-18
Díaz's course "Bad Bunny and Resistance in Puerto Rico" is the centerpiece for this podcast. She is featured throughout.
Vanessa Díaz exposes violence Latino paparazzi face in 'Manufacturing Celebrity'
NBC News online
2020-09-01
Feature article about Díaz's book, Manufacturing Celebrity. Article and interview by Gwen Aviles, NBC News/NBC Latino
‘Manufacturing Celebrity’ Spotlights Exploitation in Hollywood-Obsessed Media
LibroMobile online
2020-09-04
In depth review about Manufacturing Celebrity and interview with Díaz. Interview and article by Gabriel San Roman.
Hate Crimes and Donald Trump: Why It’s So Hard to Prosecute Racist, Hateful Acts
International Business Times online
2016-12-01
Interviewed by Jason Le Miere.
How ‘Brangelina’ Gave a Couple Its Mystique
The Atlantic online
2016-09-22
Interviewed by Spencer Kornhaber, The Atlantic.
Why the Angelina Jolie-Brad Pitt marriage mattered so much in modern Hollywood
Los Angeles Times print
2016-09-20
Interviewed by Lorraine Ali, Los Angeles Times.
Cuban hip-hop culture comes to Michigan
National Public Radio (NPR) of Michigan radio
2011-10-05
Appearance on National Public Radio (NPR) of Michigan.
Uprising Radio
KPFK Radio Pacifica, 90.7 FM radio
2006-10-13
Interviewed by Sonali Kolhatkar for “Uprising Radio,” KPFK Radio Pacifica, 90.7 FM. Feature story on documentary Cuban HipHop: Desde el Principio.
Courses (3)
Introduction to Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies
Introduction to Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies
Race, Media, and Representation
Race and Media
Bad Bunny and Resistance in Puerto Rico
Benito Martínez Ocasio, better known as Bad Bunny, is breaking musical records, breaking gender stereotypes, and centering his homeland of Puerto Rico in everything he does. What does it mean for an all-Spanish-language act from Puerto Rico to be biggest musical artist in the world? Bad Bunny has been the world’s most-streamed artist on Spotify for two consecutive years, has the longest-running Spanish-language album at the top of the Billboard chart, and in 2022 became the only artist in history to stage two separate $100 million-grossing tours in less than 12 months. As we examine his impact on global popular music and culture, we will consider what Bad Bunny can teach us in Latinx Studies. Through film, popular media, and interdisciplinary academic texts, we will explore his role in the mass 2019 protests in Puerto Rico, what these protests and ongoing struggles in Puerto Rico teach us about U.S. colonialism and Puerto Rican politics, and what Bad Bunny’s increasingly anti-colonial stance says about the current state of resistance in Puerto Rico (particularly among Puerto Rican youth). We will also pay particular attention to the politics of race, gender, and queerness in Bad Bunny’s performance, and how these politics disrupt dominant Latinx media representations. Overall, this course will explore these topics by closely situating Bad Bunny’s work in relation to key texts in Latinx Studies regarding colonialism, race, resistance, gender, and sexuality.
Articles (11)
Manufacturing Celebrity: How Latino Paparazzi and Women Reporters Build the Hollywood Industrial Complex
Duke University PressAugust 2020
The Power of Popular Protest: El Verano Boricua, 2019
Latin American PerspectivesCo-author
May 2020. Photo essay
Raciontologies: Rethinking Anthropological Accounts of Institutional Racism and Enactments of White Supremacy in the U.S.
American AnthropologistCo-author.
December 2019. “Raciontologies: Rethinking Anthropological Accounts of Institutional Racism and Enactments of White Supremacy.” American Anthropologist. Co-author. https://doi.org/10.1111/aman.13353
Hollywood Diversity Report. Fourth Annual. UCLA Bunche Center for African American Studies sponsored, self-published sociological study.
Self-published sociological study2017. Hollywood Diversity Report. Fourth Annual. UCLA Bunche Center for African American Studies sponsored, self-published sociological study. Co-author.
HateCrimeMap.com
HateCrimeMap.com2016-present. HateCrimeMap.com. Co-founder, co-PI, co-designer of this user-generated digital mapping site to track hate crimes and harassment since the 2016 U.S. presidential election; responsible for collaborating on research, input, design, volunteer recruitment and coordination. Housed at the UCLA American Indian Studies Center.
At the Margins of Celebrity Culture: Criminalizing the Latina/o Paparazzi of Los Angeles
Anthropology News2015. At the Margins of Celebrity Culture: Criminalizing the Latina/o Paparazzi of Los Angeles. Anthropology News, 56 (11-12), 31-32.
Brad & Angelina: And Now…Brangelina!
Bloomsbury Academic Press2015. “Brad & Angelina: And Now…Brangelina!”: A Sociocultural Analysis of Blended Celebrity Couple Names. Chapter in the anthology First Comes Love: Power Couples, Celebrity Kinship, and Cultural Politics. Neil Ewin and Shelley Cobb, eds. Bloomsbury Academic Press.
Latinos at the Margins of Celebrity Culture: Informal Image Sales and the Politics of Paparazzi
NYU Press2014. Latinos at the Margins of Celebrity Culture: Informal Image Sales and the Politics of Paparazzi. Chapter in the anthology Contemporary Latina/o Media: Production, Circulation, Politics. Arlene Dávila and Yeidy Rivero, eds. NYU Press.
“De Puerto Rico a Nueva York, De Puerto Rico a California”: A Micro-History of Puerto Rican Activism and Pan-Ethnic Alliance in Southern California
Latino(a) Research Review2012. “De Puerto Rico a Nueva York, De Puerto Rico a California”: A Micro-History of Puerto Rican Activism and Pan-Ethnic Alliance in Southern California. Published in the Latino(a) Research Review (Fall 2012 special issue: The Legacies of Puerto Rican Social, Cultural, and Political Activism in the United States).
Cuban HipHop: Desde el Principio (From the Beginning)
Independent2006. Cuban HipHop: Desde el Principio (From the Beginning). Feature length documentary film. Independent. Director, writer, producer.
Cuban HipHop: A Contemporary Example of Transculturation.
Independent2002. Cuban HipHop: A Contemporary Example of Transculturation. Short documentary film. Independent. Director, writer, producer.
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