Notable Achievements

Assistant Professor of Communication Studies Raquel Moreira received the Innovator Award for Most Outstanding Book from the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Caucus at the Central States Communication Association Annual Conference in St. Louis, MO, for her monograph, Bitches Unleashed: Performance and Embodied Politics in Favela Funk. At the conference, Moreira also presented the paper “The Right Girl from Rio: Anita’s Crossover and Latinidad’s Whiteness” and participated in the panel discussion “Effective Inclusive Pedagogical Practices by and for Silenced Voices.”

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Assistant Professor of Communication Studies

Expertise

Feminist and queer of color critique; performance studies; normative and marginalized femininities in media

My teaching and research focus on the intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality in media and performance communication contexts. I enjoy helping students make connections between critical theory and their everyday lives, including their own role in seeking and actualizing a better world for all. Having taught media and feminist studies for about 10 years now, I am constantly learning with and from my students and the evolving contexts around us. 

My research informs my teaching, as my primary scholarly focus is feminist and queer of color critique of artistic performances and media texts of all sorts. In my book, Bitches Unleashed: Performance and Embodied Politics in Favela Funk (Peter Lang, 2020), for instance, I collect an assembly of texts (personal and media interviews, live and recorded performances, social media posts, music videos, etc.) to both challenge and re-envision the potential of embodied politics from a transnational feminist perspective. I have published portions of this research in Queer Studies in Media & Popular Culture (2020 Monograph of the Year Award from NCA’s GLBTQ Communication Division), Women’s Studies in Communication (2018 Feminist Scholar of the Year from the Organization for Research on Women and Communication), and more.

  • Biography

    My teaching and research focus on the intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality in media and performance communication contexts. I enjoy helping students make connections between critical theory and their everyday lives, including their own role in seeking and actualizing a better world for all. Having taught media and feminist studies for about 10 years now, I am constantly learning with and from my students and the evolving contexts around us. 

    My research informs my teaching, as my primary scholarly focus is feminist and queer of color critique of artistic performances and media texts of all sorts. In my book, Bitches Unleashed: Performance and Embodied Politics in Favela Funk (Peter Lang, 2020), for instance, I collect an assembly of texts (personal and media interviews, live and recorded performances, social media posts, music videos, etc.) to both challenge and re-envision the potential of embodied politics from a transnational feminist perspective. I have published portions of this research in Queer Studies in Media & Popular Culture (2020 Monograph of the Year Award from NCA’s GLBTQ Communication Division), Women’s Studies in Communication (2018 Feminist Scholar of the Year from the Organization for Research on Women and Communication), and more.

  • Publications

    Scholarly Book

    Moreira, R. (2021). Bitches Unleashed: Performance and Embodied Politics in Favela Funk. Peter Lang, 2021. *Bonnie Ritter Outstanding Feminist Book Award

    Peer Reviewed Journal Articles

    Moreira, R. (2020). “To Be a Slut Is to Be Free”: Women in Favela Funk, Racialised Femininity, and Celebrity Media. Celebrity Studies. DOI: 10.1080/19392397.2020.1847673.

    Moreira, R. (2019). Bicha Travesti Worldmaking: Linn da Quebrada’s Disidentificatory Performances of Intersectional Queerness. Queer Studies in Media & Popular Culture, 4(3), 303-318. *Monograph of the Year Award

    Moreira, R. (2017). Now that I’m a Whore, Nobody Is Holding Me Back!’: Women in Favela Funk and Embodied Politics. Women’s Studies in Communication, 40(2), 172-189. * Feminist Scholar of the Year Award

    Peer Reviewed Book Chapters

    Moreira, R. (2020). Funk Isn’t a Trend; It’s a Necessity: Favela Funk’s Vernacular Discourse and the Struggle for Cultural Legitimation. In Ahmet Atay, Yea-Wen Chen, and Alberto Gonzalez, Memory and Intercultural Communication, Peter Lang.

    Moreira, R. (2020). De-Whitening Intersectionality through Transfeminismo. In Shinsuke Eguchi, Bernadette M. Calafell, and Shadee Abdi (Eds.), De-Whitening Intersectionality: Race, Intercultural Communication, and Politics, Rowman & Littlefield. *Anita Taylor Book Chapter Award

    Chrifi Alaoui, F., Moreira, R., Pattisapu, K., Shukri, S., & Calafell, B.M. (2014). I am Not Maria/Samira: On the Interchangeability of “Brownness” in U.S. Pedagogical Contexts. In Sonja M. Brown Givens and Keisha Edwards Tassie (Eds.), Claiming a Seat at the Table: Feminism, Underserved Women Of Color, Voice, and Resistance. Lexington Books.