Vanessa Fonseca-Chavez
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Phone: 480-727-3881
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7271 E Sonoran Arroyo Mall Mesa, AZ 85212
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Mail code: 2780Campus: Poly
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Vanessa Fonseca-Chávez is an Associate Professor of English and Assistant Vice Provost of the ASU Polytechnic campus. In her role as Assistant Vice Provost, she works on the strategic implementation of ASU's goals at the Poly campus by providing campus-level engagement to advance Poly priorities. She supports enrollment growth, community building, and student success, as well as communicating Poly's contributions to the ASU Charter and fostering relationships with external stakeholders. Prior to this role, Fonseca-Chávez served as the Associate Dean of Inclusion and Student Success for the College of Integrative Sciences and Arts from 2021-2025.
Fonseca-Chávez's is the author of Colonial Legacies in Chicana/o Literature and Culture: Looking through the Kaleidoscope (2020) with the University of Arizona Press. She is the co-editor of four books, including La Plonqui: The Literary Life and Work of Margarita Cota-Cárdenas (2023) and meXicana Roots and Routes: Listening to People, Places, and Pasts (2025). She is the co-author of Hispanics in Concho (2025). She is the co-editor of the BorderVisions book series with the University of Arizona Press, a series which publishes cutting-edge research on borderlands studies.
Fonseca-Chávez's current research focuses on understanding how rural communities in the southwest United States narrate a sense of belonging through economic migrations. She is working on a new book that explores the ways that residents of Concho, Arizona hold the memory of a community that has long been described as a ghost town.
At ASU, Fonseca-Chávez teaches undergraduate courses in English, Interdisciplinary Studies, Liberal Studies, and History. She is an affiliate faculty member of the School of Transborder Studies, the School of International Letters and Cultures and the Department of English at ASU Tempe.
Fonseca-Chávez co-directs the Following the Manito Trail project, which looks at the Hispanic New Mexican, or Manito, diaspora from the mid 19th century to the present. The Following the Manito Trail team has produced three documentaries, five museum exhibits, and has published numerous articles and book chapters.
Vanessa Fonseca-Chávez and Rafael Martínez serve as the founders and inaugural co-directors of the Latinx Oral History Lab at the ASU Polytechnic campus.
- Ph.D. Spanish Cultural Studies, Arizona State University
- M.A. Hispanic Southwest Studies, University of New Mexico
- B.A. Spanish; minor: Business Management, University of New Mexico
Fonseca-Chávez'a research interests include Chicana/o literature, Nuevomexicana/o literature, oral history and storytelling. Her most recent works examine the complex intertanglings of colonial structures in the Southwest United States and how coloniality of power manifests in literature, cultural production, and social spaces. In addition to this work, she is interested in how rural communities narrate their sense of place and belonging.
RECENT BOOKS
Rosales, Jesús and Vanessa Fonseca-Chávez, eds. La Plonqui: The Literary Life and Work of Margarita Cota-Cárdenas. University of Arizona Press, 2023.
Fonseca-Chávez, Vanessa. Colonial Legacies in Chicana/o Literature: Looking through the Kaleidoscope. University of Arizona Press, 2020.
Fonseca, Chávez, Vanessa, et. al., eds. Querencia: Reflections on the New Mexico Homeland. University of New Mexico Press, 2020.
RECENT PEER REVIEWED ARTICLES
Fonseca-Chávez, Vanessa and Patricia Perea. “Son Utiles: Learning from Manito Sheep Culture.” Journal of Folklore and Education. Fall 2024.
Fonseca, Vanessa. "'Donde mi amor se ha quedado:' Narratives of Sheepherding and Querencia along the Wyoming Manito Trail." Annals of Wyoming, vol. 89, no. 2/3, 2017, p. 6-12.
RECENT BOOK CHAPTERS
Fonseca-Chávez, Vanessa. “We Were Always Chicanos, or, We Did it Our Way: Situated Citizenship in the Equality State.” Histories of Cultures of Latinas: Suffrage, Activism and Women’s Rights, edited by Montse Feu and Yolanda Padilla. Houston: Arte Público Press. Fall 2023.
Martínez, Trisha and Vanessa Fonseca-Chávez. "Finding and Building Community on the Manito Trail." Western Lands, Western Voices: History at Work in the American West, edited by Gregory E. Smoak. 85-100. University of Utah Press, 2021.
OTHER PUBLICATIONS AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY
Following the Manito Trail Co-Director, 2015-present.
Following the Manito Trail is an interdisciplinary project that seeks to document the histories and stories of the Hispanic New Mexican, or Manito, diaspora from the mid 1800's to the present. You can learn more about the Following the Manito Trail project HERE.
Fonseca-Chávez, Vanessa, Scott Henkel, and Mary Katherine Scott. "The Materiality of Land in Salt of the Earth." The Routledge Handbook of American Material Culture, edited by Kristin Haus. Forthcoming.
Fonseca-Chávez, Vanessa. "Rosaura Revueltas y su compromiso social." Puentes: Revista méxico-chicana de literatura, cultura, y arte. No. 13, Fall 2022, p. 68-83.
Fonseca-Chávez, Vanessa. "Reflections on Reconstructing a Chicana/o Literary Heritage: Hispanic Colonial Literature of the Southwest," edited by María Herrera-Sobek. University of Arizona Press, Open Arizona. 2020.
Fonseca-Chávez, Vanessa. "New Mexico Newspapers." Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Latino Literature. Oxford University Press, 2019.
Courses
2026 Spring
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| ENG 498 | Pro-Seminar |
| HST 495 | Methods of Historical Inquiry |
2025 Fall
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| IDS 401 | Integration: Experiential |
2025 Spring
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| IDS 401 | Integration: Experiential |
2024 Fall
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| IDS 314 | Integratv Persp Cultural Dynam |
| IDS 314 | Integratv Persp Cultural Dynam |
2023 Fall
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| ENG 363 | Transborder Chicano Literature |
| ENG 499 | Individualized Instruction |
| ENG 493 | Honors Thesis |
2023 Spring
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| SOS 498 | Pro-Seminar |
| FIS 494 | Special Topics |
| HUL 494 | Special Topics |
| HUL 598 | Special Topics |
| ENG 494 | Special Topics |
2022 Fall
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| ENG 590 | Reading and Conference |
| ENG 597 | Graduate Capstone Seminar |
| ENG 492 | Honors Directed Study |
| ENG 363 | Transborder Chicano Literature |
2022 Spring
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| ENG 334 | Am Southwest Literature & Film |
2021 Fall
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| ENG 359 | Indigenous American Literature |
| ENG 590 | Reading and Conference |
| ENG 597 | Graduate Capstone Seminar |
| ENG 492 | Honors Directed Study |
2021 Spring
| Course Number | Course Title |
|---|---|
| ENG 498 | Pro-Seminar |
| ENG 334 | Am Southwest Literature & Film |
| ENG 492 | Honors Directed Study |
| ENG 597 | Graduate Capstone Seminar |
| ENG 598 | Special Topics |