My name is Jorge Coronado and I’m a professor of Latin American Literatures at Northwestern University. For the past several years and in my capacity as President of Northwestern’s chapter of the AAUP, I’ve been actively involved in engaging a variety of issues on my campus, from lapses in or outright denials of faculty governance, to thoughtless and damaging budget cuts, to administrative reactions to the pandemic that were hardest on those faculty and other workers on campus who were already facing precarity. I’ve learned a lot about the university from those experiences, in particular about how effective organizing can be but also about the real difficulties in effecting change. The sorts of problems that I have seen on my campus aren’t simply local or idiosyncratic; they are part of a much larger situation that afflicts higher education across the United States. These circumstances have led me to run for the position of President of AAUP advocacy Local 6741 of the AFT, and I’m grateful have this opportunity to address to its members.

In order to change the current state of higher ed, I am running as part of the United Faculty for the Common Good (UFCG) slate. There are ten of us, faculty from across different ranks and institutions, and we have come together because we have all experienced the effects of corporatization, cost-cutting, underfunding and failed governance, or governance by endowment, on our campuses, as varied as they are. I’m delighted to be in the company of fellow faculty dedicated to making a difference on our campuses, now. The first step towards change is faculty working together in solidarity.

So, what do we propose?

We envision and want to make happen a future in which higher education is treated and funded as a social good and universal right. Am I preaching to the converted? I hope so. Don’t we all believe that this is how things should be? In order to achieve that goal, we need to organize politically and beyond our individual campuses. And we need to bring our on-the-ground experiences to the demands that we make in broader civil society. To do so, we must build political power through solidarity and organizing. To be conscious of our labor as the core of the university is half the battle. We as faculty have to be responsible for fighting this fight, no one else can do it for us. So I hope you will considering supporting us.

Thank you.

Biographical Information

Jorge Coronado is Professor of modern Latin American and Andean literatures and cultures at Northwestern University. His undergraduate courses range across the 19th and 20th centuries and draw from various disciplines and cultural practices, such as history, archaeology, anthropology, music, photography, and literature. His graduate courses focus on two areas: literary and cultural theory and Andean studies.  He has taught in the Department of Spanish & Portuguese as well as in Comparative Literary Studies Program and the Program in Latin American & Caribbean Studies, where he is a core faculty member. Beyond these, his affiliations at Northwestern include the Andean Cultures & Histories working group, the Center for Native American & Indigenous Research, the Program in Critical Theory, and the German Department.

He is the author of The Andes Imagined: Indigenismo, Society, and Modernity (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2009) and Portraits in the Andes: Photography and Agency, 1900-1950 (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018). A co-edited volume on visual practices in relation to notions of landscape and region entitled Visiones de los Andes. Ensayos críticos sobre el concepto de paisaje y región (Entretejiendo. Crítica y teoría cultural latinoamericana series. Plural Editores and University of Pittsburgh) appeared in 2019 in La Paz. A co-edited anthology of anarchist and Marxist-influenced writing entitled Anarquismos y marxismos en Bolivia, Ecuador y Peru. Textos esenciales (Ediciones Achawata) appeared in 2023 in Lima. His work on the editorial boards includes the PMLA, the Revista de Estudios Hispánicos, the Bolivian Studies Journal, and Iberoamericana Vervuert's Los ojos en las manos book series.  In 2021, he assumed the responsibilities of Series Editor for Illuminations: Cultural Formations of the Americas at the University of Pittsburgh Press, which publishes cutting edge research in Latin American literary and cultural studies.

At Northwestern, he has been active in building the Department of Spanish & Portuguese and the Program in Latin American & Caribbean Studies. He served as Chair of the former for two three-year terms (2010-2017), oversaw its renovation, and inaugurated its doctoral program.  He served as Director of LACS and currently is Director of the Andean Cultures & Histories working group at the Weinberg College Center for International and Areas Studies. He is President of the campus AAUP chapter.