research
My research explores the relations between science, art, and politics. It does so by posing questions such as these: How do ideas travel across distinct practical contexts? How does a scientific concept, for example, become “culture” (e.g., in film, painting, poetry, etc.)? How does a poet’s imagination anticipate the breakthroughs of scientific theories? And how do these encounters transform social relations and political practices? Developing answers to these questions requires an interdisciplinary framework. My philosophical work often begins from a non-ideal and pragmatic approach to the philosophy of science and social and political philosophy. I think of science, politics, and art as social practices grounded in contingent historical contexts. This has led me to take up empirically informed cases to account for how different values shape conceptions of science and modernity in radical political and artistic experiments led by Indigenous philosophers and social movements in the Latin American context.
My current project, Theory of the Encounter of Practices: Science, Art, and Politics in Latin America, investigates how scientific ideas are taken up and transformed by artistic and political practices in the region. I examine two canonical case studies in the long 20th century: (1) the philosophical and political writings of José Carlos Mariátegui as well as the avant-garde magazine Amauta in Perú and (2) the communiques of Subcomandante Marcos (Galeano) as well as the artistic production of indigenous Zapatista communities of Southern México. Alongside these two case studies, I develop a philosophical theory of the encounter of practices that transforms how we conceptualize science and its relation to art and politics and reconsiders its emancipatory potential today.
While working on my current project, I have published multiple essays and translations on the politics and theory of Abolition, Marx's "science of contingency," and the revolutionary philosophy of science of Mauricio Malamud. You can find all my published research and translations on this website.
Image: "Unión de la Expresión Artistica del Norte y Sur de este Continente,"
a mural by Diego Rivera featuring Aztec goddess Coatlicue melded with Detroit machinery.