Photo: Barbara Reyes

Barbara Reyes

  • Working Retiree

    • / 505 277-6414

    • B.A. in Sociology and Communication, University of California at San Diego, 1981
    • M.A. in Latin American Studies, University of California at San Diego, 1992
    • Ph.D. in History, University of California at San Diego, 2000
      Nominated for Outstanding Work by Faculty of Color at UNM Award, Presented by Project for New Mexico Graduates of Color (PNMGC, UNM), Spring ’11  Elected to Nominating Committee of Western History Association, 2009-2011  Recognition for Outstanding Work by Faculty of Color at UNM, presented by the Project for New Mexico Graduates of Color (PNMGC), Raza Graduate Student Association (RGSA), Black Graduate & Professional Student Association (BPGSA), and the Society for Native American Graduate Students (SNAGS), UNM Spring 2008  Ford Foundation Post-Doctoral Fellow, 2002-2003, National Research Council Susan Geiger Award, Research Grant, 2002, Feminist Research Institute, UNM UNM Faculty Research Grant, 2002  RECENT CONFERENCE PARTICIPATION AND PRESENTATIONS AT PROFESSIONAL MEETINGS:  “Analisis de la construccion politica de esterotipos de identidad atraves de imagenes visuales: la trayectoria del arte Chicana/o.” Workshop presented at the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, Unidad Azcapotzalco, November 29, 2013.  Keynote Address, “La racializacion del inmigrante a Estados Unidos atravez de imagenes visuales.” Seminario “Documentario Visual: Historia No Escrita.” Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, Mexico, D.F. November 28, 2013  “Environmental Challenges in the History of North America: European Settlement and the Management of Nature, Panel Chair, Western History Association Annual Conference, Tucson, AZ, Oct. 9-12, 2013  Panel Moderator,  “Introduction to New Mexico Politics and Public Life,”Ready to Run NM Symposium; UNM, Albuquerque, NM, April 12-13, 2013  Roundtable Participant, “Drink Historia: From EnGendered History to Bifurcated Narratives, Three generations of Chicana Historians Examine the Past and Envision the Future,” National Association of Chicana/Chicano Studies, San Antonio, TX, March 21, 2013.  Panel Moderator, Everyday Practices of Popular Power: Art, Media, Immigration Symposium, “Art & Immigrant Rights Panel,” UNM, Albuquerque, NM, November 9, 2012  Closing Keynote Address, “Discursos de poder, raza y clase en la inmigracion a Estados Unidos.” Conferencia Magistral de Clausura,Universidad Autonoma de Baja California, Instituto de InvestigacionesHistoricas Annual International Conference, Jornadas Internacionales:Historia,Patrimonio y Frontera, Tijuana, BC, Mexico, 7 September, 2012   “Mixed/Transnational Families in the Borderlands” Panel Chair and Commentator, American Historical Association Pacific Coast Branch, Annual Conference, San Diego, CA, August 10, 2012,  “Surveillance and Confinement in the American West,” Chair, WHA Committee on Race and the West Panel, Western History Association Annual Conference, Oakland, CA, October 13-16, 2011.  “Reading Mestiza Voices: Californiana Testimonials, Place and Agency in the War of Independence,” Presenter, National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies Conference, Pasadena, CA, March 30-April 2, 2011.  “A través de los ojos de las mujeres. Alta California en los primeros años del siglo XIX”.  Paper Presented at the V Jornadas Internacionales: Historia, Patrimonio y Frontera, “La Independencia y Revolución en las Californias y el noroeste mexicano”. Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Tijuana, Baja California, September 23, 2010  Teaching About Women, Gender and Sexuality in the West. Roundtable Participant, Western History Association Annual Conference, Denver, CO, October 7-10, 2009.  “La lucha de las comunidades nativas por la conservación de sus tierras en los territorios del suroeste en el periodo mexicano. The Struggle of Native American Communities for the Preservation of their Land holdings during the Mexican Period.” Borderlands-Fronterizos Panel Commentator, Western History Association Annual Conference, Denver, CO, October 7-10, 2009. “Negotiating Cultural Production: Chicana Matters,” Presenter, 22nd Annual MALCS Summer Institute, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM, July 25, 2009  “’We Were Family Once,’ Constructing National Identity at the Periphery of Nation-States” Presenter, Ethnic Studies Department Colloquium Series, University of California, San Diego, May 20, 2009


    Dr. Reyes is currently the Director of the Women Studies Program, an active member of the U.S. West, and Gender and Women’s Comparative Histories, sections in the History department, is an affiliate in the Latin American Studies Program and the American Studies department at UNM, and serves on the Advisory Board of the Chicana and Chicano Studies Program, and the Executive Board of the Feminist Research Institute at UNM.  

    She has been involved with the WHA since her graduate student years, serving on the 2003, 07, 08 program committees, and as a member (3 years), and chair, of the Sarah Jackson dissertation award, and Bolton-Cutter award (2008) committees. She is also a co-founder (2003), and organizer, of the Borderlands-Fronterizos Group, for which she has organized yearly panels and workshops on Mexican North and U.S. Southwest borderlands scholarship, and continues efforts to further develop scholarly transnational conversations on Chicana/o-Borderlands-Fronterizo research. For this effort, she heads the Transnational Working Group of the Southwest Hispanic Research Institute in the development of a broad network of universities and research institutions that are focused on borderlands/fronterizo research collaboration, the organizing of transnational conferences and events, and the mentoring and exchange of graduate students specializing in the field.


    • History of New Mexico
    • Immigration to U.S.
    • Early History Mexican-Americans
    • Hispanic Frontiers
    • Women and U.S./Mexico Borderlands History
    • Chicana/o History
    • Gender and Race in U.S. History

    Private Women, Public Lives; Gender and the Missions of the Californias, University of Texas Press 2009

    Nineteenth Century California Testimonials, co-authored with Rosaura Sánchez and Beatrice Pita, Special Edition CRITICA: A Journal of Critical Essays (1994)

    “From Mythologizing the Tragedy to Parodying the Myth: Two Representations of the Mexican Revolution.” CRITICA: A Journal of Critical Essays (Spring 1998)

    “Race, Agency and Memory in Baja California Missions,” Continental Crossroads: Remapping U.S.-Mexican Borderlands History, Samuel Truett and Elliott Young, eds., ( Duke University Press, )

    Nosotras las Mujeres, Alta California en el siglo XIX desde la perspectiva de las Californianas.” Accepted for publication, Special Edition, Revista Meyibó, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico, forthcoming.

    “Detengan a esa mujer!: Etnia, raza y género en las Californias de la época colonial.” Accepted for publication, Revista Meyibó, Journal of the Universidad Autonoma de Baja California, Mexico, Num. 2, Nueva Época, Julio-Diciembre, 2010.

    WORKS IN PROGRESS

    Bárbara O. Reyes & Lucila del Carmen León Velazco,“El Norte Mexicano y el Suroeste Americano: La periferia de dos naciones y su estudio transnacional, A New Approach on the Mexico/U.S. Borderlands.” 

    Bárbara O. Reyes, “Latina Leadership in Mainstream Politics: Civil Right or Civic Duty.”  Research in progress.


    Dr. Reyes joined the History Department at UNM in 2000, specializing in Chicana/o, Borderlands, and Immigration histories with a focus on race, gender, ethnicity and transnational studies. Her book, Private Women/Public Lives, Gender and the Missions of the Californias, University of Texas Press, 2009, and her work-in-progress offer a new approach to the study of the Mexico/U.S. Borderlands that is centered on the intersection of gender, race, class, and notions of citizenship and national identities analyses.  A new book project that will analyze the legacy of Southwest Chicanas in mainstream U. S. politics examines the agency of Latina women in regional, national and international political spaces, and highlights the cultural, social and religious influences that serve to empower them, while at the same time may function to constrain their work. 

    Nominated for Outstanding Work by Faculty of Color at UNM Award, Presented by Project for New Mexico Graduates of Color (PNMGC, UNM), Spring ’11

     Elected to Nominating Committee of Western History Association, 2009-2011

     Recognition for Outstanding Work by Faculty of Color at UNM, presented by the Project for New Mexico Graduates of Color (PNMGC), Raza Graduate Student Association (RGSA), Black Graduate & Professional Student Association (BPGSA), and the Society for Native American Graduate Students (SNAGS), UNM Spring 2008

     Ford Foundation Post-Doctoral Fellow, 2002-2003, National Research Council

    Susan Geiger Award, Research Grant, 2002, Feminist Research Institute, UNM

    UNM Faculty Research Grant, 2002

     RECENT CONFERENCE PARTICIPATION AND PRESENTATIONS AT PROFESSIONAL MEETINGS:

     “Analisis de la construccion politica de esterotipos de identidad atraves de imagenes visuales: la trayectoria del arte Chicana/o.” Workshop presented at the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, Unidad Azcapotzalco, November 29, 2013.

     Keynote Address, “La racializacion del inmigrante a Estados Unidos atravez de imagenes visuales.” Seminario “Documentario Visual: Historia No Escrita.” Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, Mexico, D.F. November 28, 2013

     “Environmental Challenges in the History of North America: European Settlement and the Management of Nature, Panel Chair, Western History Association Annual Conference, Tucson, AZ, Oct. 9-12, 2013

     Panel Moderator,  “Introduction to New Mexico Politics and Public Life,”Ready to Run NM Symposium; UNM, Albuquerque, NM, April 12-13, 2013

     Roundtable Participant, “Drink Historia: From EnGendered History to Bifurcated Narratives, Three generations of Chicana Historians Examine the Past and Envision the Future,” National Association of Chicana/Chicano Studies, San Antonio, TX, March 21, 2013.

     Panel Moderator, Everyday Practices of Popular Power: Art, Media, Immigration Symposium, “Art & Immigrant Rights Panel,” UNM, Albuquerque, NM, November 9, 2012

     Closing Keynote Address, “Discursos de poder, raza y clase en la inmigracion a Estados Unidos.” Conferencia Magistral de Clausura,Universidad Autonoma de Baja California, Instituto de InvestigacionesHistoricas Annual International Conference, Jornadas Internacionales:Historia,Patrimonio y Frontera, Tijuana, BC, Mexico, 7 September, 2012

      “Mixed/Transnational Families in the Borderlands” Panel Chair and Commentator, American Historical Association Pacific Coast Branch, Annual Conference, San Diego, CA, August 10, 2012,

     “Surveillance and Confinement in the American West,” Chair, WHA Committee on Race and the West Panel, Western History Association Annual Conference, Oakland, CA, October 13-16, 2011.

     “Reading Mestiza Voices: Californiana Testimonials, Place and Agency in the War of Independence,” Presenter, National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies Conference, Pasadena, CA, March 30-April 2, 2011.

     “A través de los ojos de las mujeres. Alta California en los primeros años del siglo XIX”.  Paper Presented at the V Jornadas Internacionales: Historia, Patrimonio y Frontera, “La Independencia y Revolución en las Californias y el noroeste mexicano”. Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Tijuana, Baja California, September 23, 2010

     Teaching About Women, Gender and Sexuality in the West. Roundtable Participant, Western History Association Annual Conference, Denver, CO, October 7-10, 2009.

     “La lucha de las comunidades nativas por la conservación de sus tierras en los territorios del suroeste en el periodo mexicano. The Struggle of Native American Communities for the Preservation of their Land holdings during the Mexican Period.” Borderlands-Fronterizos Panel Commentator, Western History Association Annual Conference, Denver, CO, October 7-10, 2009.

    “Negotiating Cultural Production: Chicana Matters,” Presenter, 22nd Annual MALCS Summer Institute, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM, July 25, 2009

     “’We Were Family Once,’ Constructing National Identity at the Periphery of Nation-States” Presenter, Ethnic Studies Department Colloquium Series, University of California, San Diego, May 20, 2009