Mourning and Mobilization in the Americas

Shows how communities across the Americas transform their grief over murdered and missing trans and non-trans women, girls, and two-spirit people into powerful social movements that challenge state violence and demand justice.

A groundbreaking and transnational examination of gender-based violence, Mourning and Mobilization in the Americas reimagines how we understand the relationship between grief and political action. Lydia Huerta Moreno brings together the work of activists, scholars, artists, writers, and influencers from 1994 to 2023 to chronicle the intersection of activism with the rise of social media and the eventual implementation of legislation codifying woman killing as a crime. Expanding the concept of feminicide to encompass trans women, two-spirit people, and missing and murdered women and girls across the Americas, Huerta Moreno illuminates the deep connections between different forms of gender-based violence across the Americas and weaves together questions of race, class, gender, and immigration status. Through innovative and sensitive analysis of postmortem politics, the book reveals how communities transform profound loss into powerful social movements, from Mexico to Brazil to the United States and Canada and beyond. With a foreword by Sayak Valencia, Mourning and Mobilization in the Americas is a must-read for activists, scholars, and anyone concerned with human rights, revealing how grief can spark resistance against systemic violence and government inaction.

Author Biography

Lydia Huerta Moreno is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Gender, Race, and Identity at the University of Nevada, Reno. She is coeditor, with Christina Sanchez Volatier, of Introduction to Latinx Studies: A Social Science and Cultural Studies Reader.