Professor, Performing Arts & American Culture Studies, Fall 2023 | Elaine Peña’s teaching and research interests include border studies, hemispheric Latinx performance, and religious studies. She is the author of Performing Piety: Making Space Sacred with the Virgin of Guadalupe (University of California Press, 2011), an ethnographic study of transnational devotional practices between central Mexico and the greater Chicago area. Her recent book, ¡Viva George!: Celebrating Washington’s Birthday at the U.S.-Mexico Border (University of Texas Press, 2020), critically examines acts of playing Indian, playing Mexican, and playing Colonial as part of the long-standing tradition of celebrating Washington’s Birthday between Laredo, Texas and Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas. Peña‘s current manuscript project–Time to Pray–builds on her research at the Port of Laredo to consider the global diversity of religious practice and place-making. She is also a co-Principal Investigator on a project that explores border enactment theory, border festivals, and practical governance in West Africa. Her work has been published in a wide range of journals that reflect the transdisciplinary reach of her scholarship, and has been recognized by the Ford Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Fulbright-Hays Program, and the McNair Scholars Program.