“I Change Myself, I Change the World”: Gloria Anzaldúa's Sociological Imagination in Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza

Abstract

What lessons can sociologists draw from Chicana cultural theorist and spiritual activist Gloria E. Anzaldúa to advance the sociological imagination and intellectual agenda that make a public difference? In this paper I argue the key to Anzaldúa's public impact has to be sought in her thesis of the simultaneity of self and global transformations, and the intricate strategies she used to advance the thesis through her writings such as Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza (1987). Closely reading the text, I note how the transformation of self/world for Anzaldúa's essentially involves the task of bridging/transcending/healing a vast array of habitual dualisms deeply ingrained in our personal and global landscapes. Progressively unpacking Anzaldúa's sociological imagination to highlight its potential contributions to enriching the Millsian and symbolic interactionist traditions in sociology, I provide a plausible answer to the question of what is so publicly transformative and energizing in Anzaldúa's often privately focused, reflexive writings. I argue that it is the dialectic of public and private sociology informing her sociological imagination that renders her intellectual work so effective. Amid current debates on ways to advance public sociology, Anzaldúa's way of going private to advance public sociology is paradoxically effective and refreshing.