Mario Alberto V. Espinoza-Kulick

Anti-immigrant policies, xenophobia, and settler-colonialism undermine the health and wellbeing of Latinx communities, especially immigrants and Indigenous peoples. Further, the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated existing health disparities and structural vulnerabilities. However, community stakeholders are mobilizing across sectors to reduce health disparities and increase culturally responsive, multilingual strategies for inclusion and health access. This project demonstrates how a decolonial-inspired framework prioritizes questions helpful to community members and deconstructs settler-colonial norms in research. Building on years of ethnographic fieldwork and community-engaged scholarship, this study highlights how advocates and community leaders mobilized in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and how those strategies can lead to sustained efforts for health equity. This knowledge is being developed and shared directly in the community with students, local experts, and relevant scholars.