Clara E. Rodriguez

B.A., City College, CUNY
M.A., Cornell University
Ph.D., Washington University in St. Louis

My research interests and projects are wide-ranging, but they generally all involve racial/ethnic classifications, the media, and Latinos.

In the race/ethnicity area, I am currently working on the following research projects: (1) a review of the research, trends and emerging issues of two important areas: (a) how and why Latinos report their race on the census, in surveys and in more qualitative studies, i.e., the factors influencing Latino racial reporting and classification in the US. (b) how “race,” skin color and/or phenotype operate as stratifying agents among Latinos in the US (2) I hope to continue my research analyzing early decennial censuses classifications, i.e., those from 1790-1840.

In the media area, I am continuing my work on Demographic Change and the Media. The research questions I am pursuing in this area are the following: Is there a dissonance between what is reflected in our popular media and our changing demographic reality? To what extent is the media that we export world-wide reflective of these demographic changes? In other words, do they present an accurate view of the U.S. population as it is today?

And lastly, to what extent does the popular media of other industrialized countries – many of which are experiencing major change in their racial/ethnic demographic make-up – reflect their now more heterogeneous populations?

I am also working with a group that is composed of researchers in Germany, and Latinos from the US and Mexico on a project entitled "Latino Images for the 21st Century."

Dr. Clara E. Rodríguez is a Professor of Sociology at Fordham University's College at Lincoln Center. She is the author of numerous books including: Heroes, Lovers and Others (Washington, D. C.: Oxford University Press, 2008; Smithsonian Institution Press, 2004); Changing Race: Latinos, The Census and the History of Ethnicity in the United States (New York: New York University Press, 2000); Hispanics in the Labor Force: Issues and Policies, with Meléndez, E. and Barry Figueroa, J., eds. (New York: Plenum Press, 1991); Puerto Ricans: Born in the USA (Boulder, CO.: Westview Press, 1991); and Latin Looks: Images of Latinas and Latinos in U.S. Media (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997). She is the recipient of numerous research and teaching awards, including the American Sociological Association’s Award for Distinguished Contributions to Research in the Field of Latina/o Studies, her university’s Award for Distinguished Teaching in the Social Sciences, and she was designated “Distinguished Lecturer” by the Organization of American Historians.

She has been a Visiting Professor at Columbia University, MIT, and Yale University. She has also been a Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation and a Senior Fellow at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History. Previously, she was the Dean of Fordham University's College of Liberal Studies. She has written numerous articles on Latinos in the United States and is co-author of The Culture and Commerce of Publishing in the 21st Century, Stanford University Press (2007) which received the Sigma Nu National Jesuit Book Award in 2007 and was translated into Chinese. She has also been a consultant to a number of television shows and documentaries, most recently, “Dora, the Explorer” and “Sesame Street.” She was elected to a three-year term on the American Sociological Association’s Governing Council and was selected as one of the “100 Most Influential Hispanics in the nation” by Hispanic Business, October 2007. She was also appointed to the Citizens’ Stamp Advisory Committee for a three-year term by the Postmaster General and is a member of the National Council of La Raza Board of Directors.

America, As Seen on TV: How Television Shapes Immigrant Expectations Around the Globe. New York University Press, 2018.

The Culture and Commerce of Publishing in the 21st Century. (with Albert N. Greco and Robert M. Wharton), Stanford University Press, 2007. Awarded National Jesuit Book Award, 2007. Translated into Chinese (Bejing: Renmin University Press & Stanford University Press, 2011).

2004. Heroes, Lovers, and Others: the Story of Latinos in Hollywood. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.

2000. Changing Race: Latinos, the Census, and the History of Ethnicity in the United States. New York University Press.

2000. "Adiós, Borinquen querida": La diáspora puertorriqueña [The Puerto Rican Diaspora]. José E. Cruz, Edna Acosta-Belén, Margarita Benítez, Yvonne González-Rodríguez, Clara E. Rodríguez, Carlos E. Santiago, Azara Santiago-Rivera, & Barbara R. Sjostrom. CELAC (Center for Latino, Latin American, and Caribbean Studies), Albany, NY.

1997. Latin Looks: Images of Latinas and Latinos in the U.S. Media. Westview Press, Boulder, CO.

1996. Historical Perspectives on Puerto Rican Survival in the U.S., co-edited with Virginia Sánchez Korrol. Markus Wiener Publishers, Princeton, NJ.

1991. Hispanics in the Labor Force: Issues and Policies, co-edited with Edwin Meléndez and Janis Barry Figueroa. Plenum Press, NY.

1989. Puerto Ricans: Born in the U.S.A. Unwin Hyman, Boston.

N. Benevento, A. Greco, T. Pasqueralle, F. Russo, A.M. Spendley, C. E. Rodriguez, K. Sullivan, Y. Sun, Y. and R. Wharton, “Who Publishes More Books in US English Departments, Men or Women?" in Publishing Research Quarterly, DOI 10.1007/s12109-017-9548 (2017). The reference for the Print version is: Publishing Research Quarterly, 33,4(December 2017): 357-372.

Rodríguez, C. E., "Puerto Ricans: Building the Institutions for the Next Generation of Latinos” in Latin@s in New York: Communities in Transition, G. Haslip-Viera, S.Baver, and A. Falcon (Eds.) University of Notre Dame Press, 2017, pp. 57-79.

Rodríguez, C. E., López, N., and Argeros, G. “Latinos and the Colorline,” Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences (eds.) Robert Scott and Stephen Kosslyn, Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons. January (1st Quarter/Winter) 2015, pp. 1-11.

Rodríguez, C. E., “Discursive (De-)Constructions of Nation and Gender in Early Filmic Texts: Dolores Del Rio and Lupe Velez, 1924-1944.” in Of Fatherlands and ‘Motherlands’, Gender and Nation in the Americas/De Patrias y Matrias. Género y Nación en las Américas edited by Sebastian Thies, Gabriele Pisarz-Ramirez and Luzelena Gutiérrez de Velasco. Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, co-published by Bilingual Press, 2014, pp. 235-254.

Rodríguez, C. E., Miyawaki, M. and Argeros, G. “Latino Racial Reporting: To Be or Not To Be,” Sociology Compass, (2013) 7:5:390-403.

Rodríguez, C. E.,Argeros, G. and Miyawaki, M. “Does Race and National Origin Influence the Hourly Wages That Latino Males Receive?” in Invisible No More: Understanding the Disenfranchisement of Latino Men and Boys. Pedro Noguera, Aida Hurtado, Edward Fergus (Eds). New York: Routledge Press, 2012 (pp. 207-218).

"Dolores Del Rio and Lupe Velez: Working in Hollywood Film, 1924-1944,” Norteamérica, Revista Academica, 6:1:(enero-junio):69-91, academic journal published by the National Autonomous University of Mexico, 2011, 28 pp.

2006. "Latinas in the Film industry, 1911-1995," in Latinas in the United States: A Historical Encyclopedia, Vicki L. Ruiz and Virginia Sánchez Korrol, eds, pp. 497-502, 807-808. Indiana University Press.

2005. "Latinos and the Census," in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Latinos and Latinas in the United States, Suzanne Oboler and Deena J. González, eds, pp. 288-293. Scholarly and Professional Reference, Oxford University Press.

2005. "Forging a New, New York: The Puerto Rican Community, Post-1945," in Boricuas in Gotham: Puerto Ricans in the Making of Modern New York City, Gabriel Haslip-Viera, Angelo Falcón, and Félix Matos Rodríguez, eds, pp. 195-218. Marcus Wiener Publishers, Princeton, NJ.

2004. reprint of "Placing Race in Context," in Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Issues in Race and Ethnicity, 5th edition, Raymond D'Angelo and Herbert Douglas, eds, Dushkin/McGraw Hill, a division of the McGraw-Hill Companies. [Clara Rodriguez and Hectore Cordero-Guzman, “Placing Race in Context,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 15/4 (1992):523-541.]

2004. Rodriguez, Clara E., Irma M. Olmedo, and Mariolga Reyes-Cruz. "Deconstructing and contextualizing the historical and social literature on Puerto Ricans." In Handbook of Research on Multicultural Education, James A. Banks and Cherry A. McGee Banks, eds, pp. 288-312. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco.

2004. Congressional testimony published in U.S. House of Representatives report on "Diversifying Hollywood: Hispanic Representation in the Media," Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Joint Forum of Task Forces on Corporate America, Technology, Telecommunications, and Arts & Entertainment, Forum Report, September 8, 2004, pp. 23-27, 49. Congress of the United States, Washington, DC.

Undergraduate

• Race and Ethnicity in the Media
• Hispanic Women
• Latino Images in the Media
• Hispanics in the U.S.A.
• Introduction to Sociology
• Research Methods
• Senior Research Seminar
• Images of Latinos in the US Media
• Hispanics in the US
• Old and New Minorities
• "Race" and "Mixed Race"
• Diversity in American Society
• Hispanic Women; American Pluralism
• Research Methods
• Statistics
• Introduction to Sociology
• Research Methods in Business and the Social Sciences
• Real Estate and Social Trends in New York City
• The City and Its Neighborhoods
• Race and Ethnicity in the Media
• History and Culture of Latino Communities in the US
• Latino Studies Seminar
• Economics and Society
• Economic and Social Issues in the City
• Freshman Interdisciplinary Program

Graduate

• Race and Ethnicity in the Media
• Race and Ethnicity in Comparative Contexts