Introduction to Latina and Latino Literature/Cecilia Rodriguez- Milanes

Cecilia Rodríguez- Milanés

Brief Biography

Cecilia Rodríguez Milanés was born in New Jersey to Cuban parents. At age 14, she moved with her family to Miami where she earned a B.A. in English / Creative Writing at the University of Miami and a Masters at Barry University. She married in Miami and then moved to upstate New York where she studied writing with Toni Morrison at the State University of New York at Albany. She lives with her partner and children in Orlando where she has taught writing and literature at the University of Central Florida since 1999. Her first collection of stories, Marielitos, Balseros and Other Exiles was published in 2009. She was the 2010 winner of the Longleaf Poetry Chapbook Prize with her Everyday Chica; this was followed by Everyday Chica, Music and More, a poetry CD set to Caribbean music in collaboration with Kevin Meehan and Jorge Milanes. Her second collection of short stories, Oye What I'm Gonna Tell You, was published in 2015. Rodríguez is a Professor of English in the College of Arts and Humanities and also the Department of English Honors in the Major Coordinator. She served as the faculty advisor for two student organizations serving diverse students: UCF’s Hispanic American Student Association and Lambda Theta Alpha.Rodríguez. Rodríguez directed the UCF’s Women’s Studies Program in 2000-2001.

Place in Latina/o Literature

Rodríguez Milanés has been active as a creative writer since her days as an Undergraduate at the University of Miami in the early 1980s, and she has published steadily since then with short fiction, poetry and nonfiction (including scholarship in race/class/gender and writing) appearing in journals such as The Bilingual Review and The Women’s Review of Books, and edited collections such as Iguana Dreams, Coming to Class, Writing In Multicultural Settings and Americanos.

Miscellaneous Links

• Youtube video of Rodríguez-Milanés discussing her book Marielitos, Balseros and Other Exiles - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyC0vlXLrRg#watch-main-area

• Poem, "Back when I was a Quinceañera" by Rodríguez-Milanes -http://www.methodist.edu/longleaf/chica.htm