Adela Pineda

Adela Pineda Franco is Lozano Long Endowed Professor in Latin American Literary and Cultural Studies, and the Director of LLILAS, at the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to joining UT, she was Professor of Latin American Literature and Film at Boston University, where she also founded the Center of Latin American Studies.
Her scholarly work situates the study of specific literary and cinematic phenomena within transnational contexts and comparative, interdisciplinary frameworks, addressing the relationships between culture, politics, intellectual thought, and technology. Over a series of publications about the turn of the nineteenth century, she has approached the study of literature as a transatlantic cultural phenomenon, and in relation to other media, in particular print journalism and visual technologies. Her books on Mexican cultural studies bring forward unforeseen connections among apparently disparate fields to shape the intermingled contexts of specific historical actors and processes. Her award-winning book on American writer John Steinbeck examines the intertwined histories of Mexico and the United States through a joint, transnational approach of the two countries, and decolonizes Steinbeck‚ American literary historiography through a Mexican and cross-border vantage point. She is also well-known for her research on the international significance of the cultures of the Mexican Revolution.