Lidiana Portales Blair

What fears or anxieties did you have about going to college?

I mostly worried about not fitting in! It seemed like everyone else knew the unspoken rules and were effortlessly confident. Little did I know that everyone had imposter syndrome all the time! I spent far too much time comparing myself to other people and doubting whether I was enough.

 

  • University of Southern California; UC Santa Barbara; CSU Long Beach

To get out and try new things! Talk to different people, join new clubs, try out for interesting activities, and take on new challenges! These are important years to discover who you are, what you like, and, maybe more importantly, what you don't like. Finally, don't be afraid of setbacks or failures. We all tend to think that success is a straight path, but, in reality, we all deal with messy setbacks, rejections, and mistakes. Like Beyonce said, "Dust yourself off and you love again".

Reading, running, the beach, coffee, gardening, traveling, spending time with my kids and husband, watching Bravo :) 

  1. My family
  2. 90 Day Fiance and all the spinoffs
  3. Coffee (iced vanilla latte with almond milk)

Before coming to ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ, I worked in K-12. I was an elementary teacher and then an instructional coach. I love that now I get to work with students who are earning their teaching credentials!

My research includes historical cultural rhetorics, art history, literature, writing, decolonial theory, archival methodologies, & critical composition pedagogy. My first book, The Wound & the Stitch: A Genealogy of the Female Body from Medieval Iberia to SoCal Chicanx Art, will be published by Penn State University Press in Spring 2024. I am currently developing my second book, Get Back to Where You Once Belonged: A Chicana-Apache Professor's Autoethnography on Racial & Rhetorical Belongings. I teach CHLS 104B: Composition II, CHLS 119: Intro to Racial & Ethnic Studies, CHLS 360: Chicana/o & Latina/o Rhetoric, CHLS 370: Chicana/o Latina/o Literature, CHLS 411/511: Archival Quest: Reclaiming Latinx Rhetoric, CHLS 412A/512A: Centralizing Latinx Narratives: Seminar in Writing Self--Autoethnography, CHLS 420: Chicano Heritage in Arts of Southwest, and WGSS 442: Sexing Chicana Literature