We’re excited to kick off another year of our “Five Questions” series. This year, we’ll be featuring both first- and second-year students here at UT AMS. We look forward to sharing our amazing graduate students with you. Read on to learn more about Levina Parada!

Q: What is your background, academic or otherwise, and how does it motivate your research?

A: I am from California where agriculture and the dairy industry shape the economy, the land, and the relationships of exploitative labor. I grew up with a large, blended yet fissured family and we would have tamales and pasteles during winter time. My experience as an elementary school gardener has influenced my interest in food justice, anti-racist work, and community support that challenges ableism and fatphobia. My previous experiences as an undergraduate student exposed me to feminist critiques of militarization, feminist animal studies, queer theory, Indigenous studies, and sustainability studies, which have informed my current trajectory.

Q: Why did you decide to come to AMS at UT for your graduate work?

A: American studies is a unique field. Because I have various interests, I knew I did not want to be limited in methodology or scope of research. UT Austin has a profound history of American Studies and the many frameworks for “doing” American Studies have provided ways for scholars to pursue critical questions in a transgressive way. I was also drawn to the program because the Department of American Studies is a close-knit and supportive scholarly community.

Q: What projects or people have inspired your work?

A: My interests are inspired by community work such as mutual aid and organized protests, the legacy of the Black Panther Party, the Critical Refugee Studies Collective, my previous professors and TAs, the complexities of my friends and family, and projects around food involving: appropriation, erasure, and commodification, the work of community gardens, and explorations of citizenship. I’ve also been inspired by the people and movements that I've only read or or heard about, people who have challenged oppression and violence from generations before me, whose work has paved the way for me to enjoy the privileges I have today.

Q: What projects do you see yourself working on at UT?

A: At the moment, I can see myself pursuing work around critical food studies- which is a very vague answer. That is not to say I have a lackluster perspective about my pursuits; I am still honing in on my specific areas of study with the understanding that project interests may take different forms or change altogether.

Q: What are your goals for graduate school? What do you see yourself doing after you graduate?

A: Over the next several years of graduate school, I would like to form relationships and community with people inside and outside the setting of academia and provide support and mentorship to my peers. I’d also like to be involved in various campus and community activities with an established awareness of my capacity. I am excited because being a graduate student will carve out the little path I need- sometimes winding, bumpy, curving, or U-turning- to pursue my career goals of professorship and also conduct research that is published in an accessible and serviceable way.