The Latino Communications Project

Latina/o/x Communication Studies: Theories, Methods, and Practice spotlights contemporary Latina/o/x Communication Studies research in various theoretical, methodological, and academic contexts. Leandra H. Hernández, Diana I. Bowen, Sara De Los Santos Upton, and Amanda R. Martinez have assembled a collection of case studies that focus on health, media, rhetoric, identity, organizations, the environment, and academia. Contributors expand upon previous Latina/o/x Communication Studies scholarship by examining identity and academic experiences in our current political climate; the role of language, identity, and Latinidades in health and media contexts; and the role of social activism in rhetorical, environmental, organizational, and border studies contexts. Scholars of communication, Latin American Studies, rhetoric, and sociology will find this book particularly useful.

This book presents research by African American, Latino/a/x, and Alaskan Indian/Native American (AI/AN) communication scholars. It highlights the importance of communication and the recognition of the unique experiences that impact how health information and health care are understood through diverse racial and cultural perspectives. Each chapter advances various divergent health issues and disparities pertinent to Black, Latino/a/x, and AI/AN communities, so that the powerful aspect of the human condition to know and be known as it relates to the negotiation of health and communication can be clearly understood. Contributions to this volume unabashedly call for more equitable, community-centric, tribally-centered, and transparent scholarship on topics of health disparities, health care, marginality, medical mistrust, social justice, and media and new technology as it relates to people of color. The authors in this book are committed to research areas that invigorate and reimagine conversations among clinicians, public health professionals, classroom environments, and communities. This insightful volume seeks to shift the dominant culture paradigms and locate authors of color and their research experiences and scholarship as central to their work. It provides a space to amplify the voices of our collective lived experiences through the vehicle of rigorous engaged scholarship. The book was originally published as a special issue of Health Communication.

This volume is based upon a review of available literature and intervention experiences selected from modern and traditional societies. It is augmented by the lessons learned through the editors′ experience in teaching courses on health communication and foundation of health behavior in graduate public health programs at several leading universities in the United States and abroad over two decades. Examples and implications are also drawn from extensive involvement in diverse health and health communication projects, such as the on-going community-based public health project in South Central Los Angeles sponsored by UCLA and the Kellogg Foundation. This particular project is designed to develop health promotion communication interventions from a multicultural perspective and provides unmatched opportunities to focus on the dynamics of a multicultural community as they affect health communication interventions.

This volume provides the theoretical, methodological, and praxis-driven issues in research on interpretive, critical, and cultural approaches to health communication. It includes an international collection of contributors, and highlights non-traditional (non-Western) perspectives on health communication.