Rocio Rivera-Murillo

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Rocio Rivera-Murillo

Graduate Student

Cohort 2020-21

Email: rociorm97@g.ucla.edu

Biography

Rocio Rivera-Murillo is a first-generation college student from the Northeast San Fernando Valley. As a doctoral student in CCAS at UCLA, she studies how grassroots organizations draw on radical love to mobilize against state violence. Since 2021, Rocio has been a graduate student researcher with Million Dollar Hoods, a community-driven project that documents the human and fiscal costs of mass incarceration in Los Angeles. As a part of MDH, Rocio is currently supporting the Archiving the Age of Mass Incarceration Initiative (AAMI) project where she is co-curating a collection and exhibits on surveillance and counterinsurgency.

Education

  • M.A. Chicana/o Studies, UCLA (2022) Urban Humanities Graduate Certificate (2022)
  • B.A., Chicana/o Studies and Sociology, California State University, Northridge (2019)

Research

urban social movements, environmental justice, state violence, women of color organizing, racial geographies, abolition, radical love, archives, oral history

Selected Publications

  • Campbell, Malik, Kelly De Leon, Martha D. Escobar, Dezzerie Gonzalez, Guadalupe Granados, Carla Martinez, Diego Paniagua, Rocio Rivera- Murillo, and Tracy Sadek. “Ethnic Studies as Praxis: The Movement Against Racism at California State University, Northridge,” for Special Issue of “Commemorating 50 Years of Ethnic Studies: Reflections, Challenges, and Opportunities,” in Association for Ethnic Studies.
  • Escobar, Martha, Kiara Padilla, Paola Tapia and Rocio Rivera-Murillo. “Carcerality Research Lab: The Transformative Power of Abolition Pedagogy,” for Special Issue of “Beyond Mass Incarceration: New Horizons of Liberation and Freedom” in Public: A Journal of Imagining America.

Honors & Awards

  • Graduate Summer Research Mentorship Program (2023)
  • American Association of Geographers (AAG) Historical Geography Specialty Group (HGSG) Student Paper Ralph Brown Award (2023-2024)
  • Graduate Research Mentorship Fellowship (2021-2022)
  • Summer Mentored Research Fellowship (2021)
  • Eugene V. Cota-Robles Fellowship (2020-2024)

Courses

  • TA, CCAS 138A – Space, Place and Race (Spring 2024)
  • TA, CCAS 165 – Latinos and Latinas in Education (Winter 2024)
  • TA, CCAS 113 – Day of Dead Ritual (Fall 2023)
  • TA, CCAS 101/CCAS 189 Honors Seminar – Theoretical Concepts in Chicana/o Studies (Spring 2023)
  • TA, CCAS 10B – Introduction to Chicana/o and Central American Studies: Social Structure and Contemporary Conditions (Winter 2023)
  • TA, CCAS 10A: Introduction to Chicana/o and Central American Studies: History and Culture (Fall 2022)