Thriving in Our Identity and in the Academy: Latina Epistemology as a Core Resource

Abstract

In this article, Milagros Castillo-Montoya and María Torres-Guzmán, two intergenerational Puerto Rican female scholars, use testimonios as a method for sharing funds of knowledge that may support and encourage emerging scholars’ efforts to critique, create, and expand on current educational theories, methods, and pedagogies. They draw on Chicana feminist epistemology to analyze their six-month charlas, informal conversations. They view their own Puerto Rican experiences from this lens and, in an effort to develop a Latina Epistemology Framework, expand the existing framework through a new dimension they refer to as lucha. They also put forth a model of research that furthers the use of testimonios as a mode of inquiry and as a process that may lead to mentorship in the academy for first-generation scholars.