An innovative, wide-ranging collection of essays that address “trans” topics in spirited and challenging ways.

Gustavo Pérez Firmat, Columbia University

Lori Celaya and Sonja Watson’s intriguing and wide-ranging collection explores the multiple dimensions of the trans prefix—transnational, transcultural, transcontinental, and even transracial—among people of Latin American origin in the United States, Latin America, and Spain. This well-edited volume provides fresh insights on novels, poems, chronicles, popular songs, telenovelas, and other cultural genres, especially by promoting a broad interdisciplinary dialogue about the transformative implications of the massive movement of people across national borders. I recommend it as a significant and original contribution to the intertwined fields of Latino, Latin American, Caribbean. and Afro-Latino studies.

Jorge Duany, author of Blurred Borders: Transnational Migration between the Hispanic Caribbean and the United States (2011)

Thoroughly researched and refreshingly expansive in its areas of focus, this volume weaves an energetic, cohesive, and engaging thread of transatlanticism/culturalism/nationalism through the fields of music, literature, religion, language, and politics. Each innovative chapter stands on its own as a focused dive into how African diasporic communities navigate various forms of “crossing” to create an identity in new geographic, political, and linguistic spaces. Most significantly, however, is the work’s collective message that a thoughtful consideration of “culture from below” invites a rich, interdisciplinary discussion about the interconnectedness of migration and identity in Latin America and the Hispanic Caribbean.

Sheridan Wigginton, California Lutheran University and President of the Afro-Latin/American Research Association