Mexico Center Faculty Committee

Director

Ricard Ainslie. Photo by Christina Murray.

Ricardo C. Ainslie is M.K. Hage Centennial Professor in Education, the Department of Educational Psychology at the College of Education, The University of Texas at Austin. His work explores the intersection of psychology and culture through such topics as the psychological experience of immigration, ethnic conflicts within communities, and the relationship between individual and collective identity. He pursues these topics primarily through the descriptive methodology of qualitative inquiry, as well as examining them through books, documentary films, and photographic exhibits.

Ainslie’s extensive work in Texas and Mexico propelled his inquiry into how communities function and transform in response to significant conflict. He is particularly interested in investigating how individuals and broader cultural groups experience life within these affected communities.

A native of Mexico City, Ainslie’s multidisciplinary and integrative sensibility is evident in his extensive involvement throughout UT Austin, where he is professionally affiliated with the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies, the American Studies Program, and the Center for Mexican American Studies.

Members

Matthew Butler
Associate Professor, Dept. of History
PhD, University of Bristol
Interests: post-revolutionary Mexico; local religion; Cristero Rebellion; church and state; Latin American Catholicism; Latin American bullfight

Kelly McDonough
Assistant Professor, Dept. of Spanish & Portuguese
PhD, University of Minnesota
Interests: critical indigenous studies; Latin American Colonial literatures; ethnohistory (Nahuatl studies); decolonizing methodologies

Martha Menchaca
Professor, Dept. of Anthropology
PhD, Stanford University
Interests: social anthropology; ethnicity; gender; oral history and traditions; legal anthropology; immigration

Rebecca M. Torres
Assistant Professor, Dept. of Geography & the Environment
PhD, University of California, Davis
Interests: migration; rural development; agriculture; gender; tourism; activist scholarship

LLILAS Mexicanist faculty with Mexican scholar Marcela Lagarde (second from left) and community members

Mexicanist Faculty

With over 70 Mexicanist faculty on campus, UT Austin has one of the largest research and teaching groups on Mexico and border issues outside Mexico. Their research covers a range of interests, from Mesoamerica's culture and languages to colonial and modern history, water resources, social inequalities, migration and border issues, gender and indigenous issues, contemporary Mexican politics, and art and architecture.

Visit LLILAS Mexicanist Faculty to learn about LLILAS faculty working on Mexican, border, and Latino issues.

Resources for Mexicanists

Primeros Libros de las Americas
The Lucas Alamán Papers
Mexico Study Abroad
Texas Exes - Mexico City Chapter
Center for Mexican American Studies
Archivo de José María Luis Mora
Nettie Lee Benson Latin American Collection - Mexican Manuscript Collection