Dr. Emma Pérez earned a PhD in history from UCLA. She joined the University of Arizona as a Research Associate at the Southwest Center and a Professor in the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies in 2917. Pérez has published fiction, essays and the history monograph, The Decolonial Imaginary: Writing Chicanas into History 1999) Pérez’s first novel, Gulf Dreams, was published in 1996 and is considered one of the first Chicana lesbian novels in print. Her second novel, Forgetting the Alamo, Or, Blood Memory 2009) earned the Isherwood Writing Grant 2009) 2nd place in Historical Fiction from International Latino Books 2010) as well as the NACCS Regional Book Award for fiction 2011) Her latest novel, Electra’s Complex, is an academic mystery published in spring 2015. A collection of her essays will be published by Arte Público Press in 2023. She will also publish her dystopic novella with Arte Público Press in 2023 or 2024.