The Power of Mentorship Relationships (with Dr. Sonia Arellano)

In today's episode, I speak to Dr. Sonia Arellano about her experience pursuing her PhD and her path to attaining a tenure track professor role. Dr. Arellano discusses the impetus of her research which was inspired by the quilt work honoring migrants who have passed away in the Arizona desert after crossing the U.S./Mexico border.  She discusses grieving as a graduate student, how mentorship played a part in her success, and so much more.

About Dr. Sonia C. Arellano

Sonia C. Arellano is an assistant professor in the Department of Writing and Rhetoric at the University of Central Florida where she teaches about visual/material rhetorics and gendered rhetorics. Her scholarship broadly engages social justice issues through textiles, tactile methods and rhetorics, and mentoring of BIPOC students and faculty. You can see her scholarship in journals such as Peitho, Rhetoric Review, Compositions Studies and College Composition and Communication. Sonia was awarded the 2022 CCCC Richard Braddock Award for her research quilt and article titled “Sexual Violences Traveling to El Norte: An Example of Quilting as Method.”

Things Mentioned in This Episode:

• Stitching a Revelation: The Making of an Activist by Cleve Jones
• The Land of Open Graves: Living and Dying on the Migrant Trail by Jason De León  
• Ribero, A. M., & Arellano, S. C. (2019). Advocating Comadrismo: A Feminist Mentoring Approach for Latinas in Rhetoric and Composition. Peitho Journal, 21(2), 334-356.