The Bowling Green State University’s (BGSU) Latino/a/x Issues Conference for 2025 was held on March 26 from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. in the Bowen-Thompson Student Union. This year’s event had roughly 300 people in attendance. The goal of this “multilingual conference is to support student research; to increase the visibility of Latino/a/x cultures, politics, and interventions in BGSU and our region; and to provide a venue for the recognition of the accomplishments of our Latino/a/x communities.”
The BGSU Latino/a/x Issues Conference was organized by the School of Cultural and Critical Studies, students, faculty, and staff from the Latin American and Latino/a/x Studies Cluster, the Department of Ethnic Studies, La Unión de Estudiantes Latinos (Latino Student Union), the Division of Inclusion and Belonging, and other members of the Latino/a/x Issues Conference (LIC) Organizing Committee.
This year’s keynote speaker was Dr. Frederick Luis Aldama, AKA Professor Latinx. Professor Latinx was born in Mexico and grew up in north-central California. He has a BA from the University of California- Berkeley and his Ph.D. from Stanford University. He founded and directs the Latinx Pop Lab and the annual BIPOC PoP Comics, Gaming, Animation & Multimedia Arts Symposium at the University of Texas (UT) in Austin. He is also an award-winning author and editor who has published over 50 books, i.e., Latinx Superheroes in Mainstream Comics, The Adventures of Chupacabra Charlie, Con Papá/With Papá, Pyroclast, and a Young Adult (YA) graphic fiction book, Through Fences and Labyrinths Borne and The Absolutely (Almost) True Adventures of Max Rodriguez.
This conference had panel discussions and roundtable sessions such as “Our Worlds in Our Words- Latinidad and the Arts,” which was moderated by Prof. Valeria Grinberg Pla, and had a graduate student from BGSU, Amanda Anastasia Paniagua speaking on Entré a Nuestro Mundo: Pláticas con Frida Kahlo y Selena Quintanilla/Enter Our World: Talks with Frida Kahlo and Selena Quintanilla. A panel on “Colonialism and its Legacies in Latin America,” moderated by Prof. Amílcar Challú, and another panel on “Structural Barriers for U.S. Latino/a/x and Spanish-speaking Communities,” moderated by Prof. Carmen Alvarez. It had a roundtable discussion on “Expression of Latino/a/x Culture, moderated by Daphne Bonilla, who is a BGSU undergraduate student, and a roundtable on “Latino/a/x Cultural Influence and Activism,” which was moderated by Amanda Anastasia Paniague and Prof. Luis Moreno that included Gloria Enriquez Pizana, Ramón Perez, and Felix Lerma.
In the photo are: Gloria Enriquez Pizana, Ramón Perez, BGSU President Rodney K. Rogers, Linda Alvarado-Arce, and Dr. Frederick Luis Aldama, AKA Professor Latinx.