Rubén Martínez, professor, Fletcher
Jones Chair in Literature & Writing.
Rubén Martínez is an award-winning
journalist, author and performer. His
interests vary widely; among the topics he
examines in his courses are mixed-genre
writing, post-colonial literatures and
disapora, and the peculiar particulars of
Los Angeles (his hometown) and the American
West.
His essays, opinions and reportage have
appeared in such publications as the New
York Times, Washington Post,
Los Angeles Times, Salon,
Village Voice, The Nation,
Spin, Sojourners, and Mother
Jones. He is the recipient of a Lannan
Foundation Fellowship in Non Fiction, a Loeb
Fellowship from Harvard University’s
Graduate School of Design, a Freedom of
Information Award from the ACLU, a Greater
Press Club of Los Angeles Award of
Excellence, and an Emmy Award for hosting
PBS-affiliate KCET-TV’s Life & Times.
As a musician, Martínez has been featured
on albums by Concrete Blonde, Los Illegals,
and the Roches, and he has been active in
the spoken word and peformance scenes for
over twenty years. His books are Flesh
Life: Sex in Mexico City (with Joseph
Rodriguez, Powerhouse Books, 2006), The
New Americans (The New Press, 2004),
Crossing Over: A Mexican Family on the
Migrant Trail (Picador, 2002),
Eastside Stories (with Joseph Rodriguez,
Powerhouse Books, 1998), and The Other
Side: Notes from the New L.A., Mexico City
and Beyond (Vintage, 1993).
He is currently at work on a book about
race, class, and representation in the
American Southwest.
