Dr. Richard Minaya joined UMKC in 2022.
Research Interests
Latinx Studies
Latinx Media Studies
Caribbean Studies
History of Film and Television
Race, Gender, Class in the Media
Caribbean Studies
Latin American Media
Richard Minaya is an Assistant Professor of Latinx Studies at the Department of Race, Ethnic, and Gender Studies. He is currently working on a book-length manuscript tentatively titled: “Currents of Revolution: How Cuba Shaped U.S. Media and Latina/o Politics.” Focused on the mid- to late-twentieth century, this work examines the ways in which Latina/o political struggles and media in the U.S. were shaped by the 1959 Cuban Revolution. This project examines Cuba’s crucial role in propelling the U.S. Spanish-language media, developing Miami as a media capital, supporting Latina/o activists and artists, and pushing U.S. media towards conservatism and against the Cuban state.
“Currents of Revolution” resides at the intersections of the Cold War and the social movement era and, thus, shows the interactions between Cuban exile political activities and the social activism of Latinxs, which have long been treated as mutually exclusive. Doing so expands our understanding of Hispanic conservatism by exploring one of its key pillars: anti-communism. Minaya’s research interests also include media reception and the history of media activism, and his work can be found in the Historical Journal of Film, Radio, and Television; Jump Cut: A Review of Contemporary Media; Journal for Media History; and Chiricú Journal: Latina/o Literatures, Arts, and Cultures.
Academic Credentials
Ph.D. in Film, Television, and Media, University of Michigan
Graduate Teacher Certificate
Dissertation: Exiled Counterpoints: Cuban Exiles, Media Activism, and Latina/o Conservatism.
M.A. in Media Cultures, City University of New York, College of Staten Island
Thesis: At the Margins with Tomás Gutiérrez Alea: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in
Cuban Cinema.
B.A. in Latino and Hispanic Caribbean Studies, Rutgers University