School of Art & Design Faculty Publications and Presentations

(Re)Designing Nepantla Lived Experiences Through Zine-ing

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

6-2025

Abstract

In response to the lack of Latinx and Chicanx representation in art and design education, we present a community-based zine project called Borderland Places that validates borderlands lived experiences. Gloria Anzaldúa's nepantla, a theory of in-betweenness, zine making, and culturally sustaining pedagogies comprise our framework for Borderland Places. We include a Borderland Places methodology, analysis, and art borderlands reflections. Zine-ing affirms cultural practices and identities while allowing students to tell their stories using personal and collective voices to counter historical hegemonic practices of erasure, misrepresentation, nonrepresentation, and dismissal. Through the process of zine making, nepantla designers visually communicate and validate their lived experiences of in-betweenness. Students re-envision new multifaceted definitions of their borderlands realities and design aesthetics.

Comments

© 2025 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois Freely available online through the Visual Arts Research open access option.

Publication Title

Visual Arts Research

DOI

10.5406/21518009.51.1.11

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