Member

Elena Gonzales, PhD, is an independent scholar and curator focusing on curatorial work for social justice and museums’ roles in society today and the author of Exhibitions for Social Justice from Routledge’s Museum Meanings Series (2019). In particular, Gonzales’s research currently addresses environmental justice, racial injustice, and the intersection of these concerns with the world of museums. Gonzales received her doctorate in American Studies and Masters in Public Humanities from Brown University in 2015 and 2010 respectively. She has curated exhibitions since 2006 and has taught curatorial studies since 2010. In 2012, Gonzales was a Ford Dissertation Fellow. Now she serves on the exhibitions committee at the Evanston Art Center where she participates in planning an annual schedule of more than 20 exhibitions per year and a biannual curatorial fellowship for BIPOC curators. Gonzales has served as a visiting scholar at Northwestern University in American Studies and the School of Education and Social Policy. She is co-editor of Museums and Civic Discourse: History, Current Practice, and Future Prospects, a digital public humanities project forthcoming from Greenhouse Studios with generous support from the Whiting Foundation and the University of Connecticut’s Humanities Institute. She is also a contributing author of Seize the Moment: How Museums Can Prepare for the Post-Pandemic Age, forthcoming from Rowman & Littlefield and the American Association for State and Local History.