Melissa González-Contreras

Dr. Melissa González-Contreras received her Ph.D. in Spanish and Latin American Literature from the University of Maryland in 2017. She is a proud CSU graduate! She earned her M.A. and B.A. in Spanish from CSU, Fullerton.

Dr. González-Contreras specializes in Latin American theatrical studies. Her main area of expertise is in Southern Cone theatrical and performance studies. Particularly, Chilean theatrical production written and staged during Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship (1973-1990). She is interested in how theater served to question, delegitimize, and confront hegemonic power structures such as the state, an economic model, or the conception of the ideal citizen. Her research focuses on the mechanisms by which these productions challenge the traditional notion of theater audience, character, and space in the text and the theatrical event.

Her work on Latin American theater and Mexican cultural production has appeared in Latin American Theatre Review, A Contracorriente, Hispamérica and Decimonónica. She is also interested in further developing research on best pedagogical practices and the Latinx student experience. She is currently working on an article on two of Mauricio Pesutić’s plays, and another article that analyses the use of alternative theater spaces and the reappropriation of other traditional spaces during Pinochet’s dictatorial regime in Chile.

She is passionate not only in teaching languages, but also in creating safe and inclusive learning environments for all students, where culturally responsive pedagogy is valued.