Lorena V. Márquez

Education

• Ph.D.  History, University of California, San Diego                                        
• M.A.   History, California State University, Sacramento
• B.A.    History and Spanish, California State University, Sacramento

Research Interests

Chicana/o History, Chicana/o movement, Chicana/Latina feminisms, gender, transnationalism, Latina/o diaspora, immigration/migration, class, oral histories/testimonios, and race/ethnicity in the United States and Latin America.

Short Biography

Born in Lodi, California to Mexican migrant farmworkers and raised in nearby Galt, Dr. Lorena V. Márquez has never forgotten her roots. In fact, as the fourth of seven children who grew up in poverty with hardworking parents who made countless sacrifices, she credits her humble upbringing for the ganas (drive) to pursue her academic and activist goals. As a native Spanish-speaking daughter of immigrants and first-generation college student, she knows firsthand of the challenges many Chicanx and Latinx students face inside and outside of the classroom. In fact, as the first and only member of her family to go to college, she is keenly aware of educational inequities and is committed to making college truly accessible to all—regardless of citizenship or socio-economic background.

Dr. Márquez serves as the Project Director of the Sacramento Movimiento Chicano and Mexican American Education Project Oral History Project, a collective of Sacramento Chicana/o movement elders and organizers whose mission is to record and preserve the oral histories of Sacramento Chicana/o Movement activists from 1965-1980. During the spring 2014 and 2015 quarters, her UC Davis Qualitative Methods Research undergraduate students conducted interviews of Sacramento Chicana/o movement activists and participants as part of their course requirements. In the winter 2019 and 2020 quarters, her students transcribed the interviews. To date, there are 98 video-recorded oral histories. These interviews are housed at the Sacramento State Special Collection and University Archives. https://library.csus.edu/collection/9851. 

The findings of the interviews serve as the basis for her second book, In their Voices: Chicana/o Movement Elders Reflections on the Civil Rights Era. 

Featured Videos/Stories

• Hispanic Heritage Month: Chicano movement in the 60s and the connection to Sacramento
• Historians at Home - Lorena Márquez on Sacramento's Chicana/o Movement
• Historical collection shows impact Sac State activists had on Chicano movement
• 'It brings history alive': The nation's largest historical collection on the Chicano Movement comes from Sacramento
• Latino Change Maker: Lorena Marquez, Chicana/o studies professor at UC Davis

Selected Publications 

• La Gente: Struggles for Empowerment and Community Self-Determination in Sacramento. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2020.
• “Recovering Chicana/o Movement Historiography Through Testimonios,” in Community-Based Participatory Research: Testimonios from Chicana/o Studies, Natalia Deeb-Sossa, ed. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2019. 
• “Reinscribing the Voices of La Gente in the Narrative of the Chicano Movement,” in The Chicano Movement: Perspectives from the 21st Century, Mario T. García, ed. New York: Routledge, 2014.

Awards

• National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies (NACCS) Book of the Year Award, Honorable Mention, 2022.  
• Certificate of Recognition and Appreciation “for your instrumental assistance in the successful completion of the goals in the first phase of the oral history interview process,” Sacramento Movimiento Chicano and Mexican American Education Project Oral History Initiative, June 7, 2014. 
• Nomination for the 11th Annual ASUCD Excellence in Education Award, 2013. (This award honors instructors in their outstanding undergraduate teaching, and it is completely funded, nominated, and selected by UC Davis students.) 
• Service to the Community Award, College Assistant Migrant Program, California State University, Sacramento, 2011.