Maria Varela (born January 1940) is a Mexican-American civil rights photographer, community organizer, a writer, and a teacher. She has been actively involved in Civil Rights movements, advocating rights for indigenous communities and protects cultural heritage within African-American, Native-American, and Mexican-American in rural communities. She created and supported several non-profits organizations to help many minority groups, especially Native-American and Mexican-American. She won a
MacArthur Fellowship
The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the MacArthur Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to ...
in 1990 for her endeavor to help with the Native-American communities in northern New Mexico, southern Colorado, and northeastern Arizona to develop economic opportunities and preserve their human rights.
Early life and education
Maria Varela was born in Pennsylvania and lived in many different places in her younger days, but spent most of her time in the upper Midwest.
Raised Catholic by her Mexican father and Irish mother, she grew up in a rigorous Catholic environment.
She went to the
St. Louis Academy for Girls in Chicago, and then to
Alverno College
Alverno College is a private Roman Catholic women's college in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
History
Chartered in 1887 as St. Joseph's Normal School, Alverno became Alverno Teachers College in 1936. It adopted its current name in 1946.
Academics
Alve ...
.
In college, she joined the national
Young Christian Students
Young may refer to:
* Offspring, the product of reproduction of a new organism produced by one or more parents
* Youth, the time of life when one is young, often meaning the time between childhood and adulthood
Music
* The Young, an American roc ...
(YCS) program where she was given the position to travel the country to encourage young students to support
Civil Rights Movements
Civil rights movements are a worldwide series of political movements for equality before the law, that peaked in the 1960s. In many situations they have been characterized by nonviolent protests, or have taken the form of campaigns of civil ...
.
In 1963, Varela went deep in the south to support the Civil Rights Movements where she began working with the
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC, often pronounced ) was the principal channel of student commitment in the United States to the civil rights movement during the 1960s. Emerging in 1960 from the student-led sit-ins at segrega ...
in Alabama and Mississippi.
She later graduated from
University of Massachusetts
The University of Massachusetts is the five-campus public university system and the only public research system in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The university system includes five campuses (Amherst, Boston, Dartmouth, Lowell, and a medica ...
.
She married Lorenzo Zuniga Jr.
She now lives in
Albuquerque
Albuquerque ( ; ), ; kee, Arawageeki; tow, Vakêêke; zun, Alo:ke:k'ya; apj, Gołgéeki'yé. abbreviated ABQ, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Mexico. Its nicknames, The Duke City and Burque, both reference its founding in ...
.
Career
From a young age, Maria Varela has been actively involved in various civil rights movements and organizations, from the Young Christian Student (YCS) program to Latinx Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), which sets a foundation for her later work in the Civil Rights movement and in helping Native-American and Mexican-American communities
She helped organize rural development and find Tierra Wools co-op.
She was also photographer for
Black Star (photo agency) Black Star, also known as Black Star Publishing Company, was started by refugees from Germany who had established photographic agencies there in the 1930s. Today it is a New York City-based photographic agency with offices in London and in White Pla ...
that works to include African-American representations for voters education, capturing critical moments in the Civil Rights Movement.
She was also a visiting professor at
Colorado College
Colorado College is a private liberal arts college in Colorado Springs, Colorado. It was founded in 1874 by Thomas Nelson Haskell in his daughter's memory. The college enrolls approximately 2,000 undergraduates at its campus. The college offer ...
,
and was adjunct professor at
University of New Mexico
The University of New Mexico (UNM; es, Universidad de Nuevo México) is a public research university in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Founded in 1889, it is the state's flagship academic institution and the largest by enrollment, with over 25,400 ...
.
Civil rights movement
Since college, Maria Varela has been actively involved in the
civil rights movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
t. She believed in what is called “the great leader” theory: in order to have a powerful social movement, the movement needs a powerful leader.
She not only supported the people she believed to be great leaders in supporting the
Civil Rights Movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
, but she also functioned as a critical figure behind the camera to capture the significant moments in the
Civil Rights Movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
.
Varela recognized the urgent issue of how the images provided for voter education materials excluded African American community and lacked diversity in racial representation.
Thus, her works focused on documenting the significant steps made by African American leaders and captured the progression and evolvement of the
Civil Rights Movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
.
Literacy works
Maria Varela's literacy work is one of the most under-recognized and almost unstudied literacies in the U.S.
However, her multimodal works, collaboratively produced by Varela and the African American community, make the important argument about community activism, which is crucial and novel but seldom discussed.
Her work plays a critical role in those communities developing a new ethos of place: an imagined and embodied relationship between local and national communities that offers a new identity and sense of participatory agency.
Rural communities
In 1962, Maria Varela was invited to start agricultural cooperatives and community health clinics in New Mexico.
Since then, she has been working with indigenous leaders to help them develop economic opportunities and protect cultural heritage within African-American, Native-American, and Mexican-American rural communities.
Varela co-founded Ganados del Valle in 1981, a nonprofit, economic development corporation that dedicates to predominantly help Hispanic and Native-American communities in northern New Mexico, southern Colorado, and northeastern Arizona to preserve their pastoral cultures, lands, and water rights. She helped created a wool-growers cooperative that included a weaving and spinning enterprise, training in small business development, and cultural reaffirmation.
She spent years trying to create and enable nonprofit organizations and viable enterprises to build upon and add to existing local resources, and was awarded was an
MacArthur Award
The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the MacArthur Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to ...
in 1990.
More works
*
*Maria Varela (9 August 2019). ''“Time to Get Ready,''” ''Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts by Women in SNCC.'' Urbana: University of Illinois Press. pp. 552–572.
*Maria Varela (21 October 2021). Video of Photo Exhibit: RESISTANCE THROUGH MY LEN. Toward Common Causehttps.
https://towardcommoncause.org/calendar/macarturos-platicas/
References
External links
*http://word.world-citizenship.org/wp-archive/2520
*http://www.macfound.org/fellows/414/
*https://www.wholecommunities.org/pdf/alumni/peace_or_pacification.pdf
*http://sait.usc.edu/spectrum/events_details.asp?EventID=747
{{DEFAULTSORT:Varela, Maria
1940 births
Community organizing
Alverno College alumni
University of Massachusetts Amherst alumni
Colorado College faculty
MacArthur Fellows
Living people
People from Chicago
People from Albuquerque, New Mexico
University of New Mexico faculty
Fellows of the American Physical Society