Dr. Vanessa Díaz

Dr. Vanessa Díaz is a professor, multimedia ethnographer, and journalist whose work focuses on issues of race, gender, and labor in popular culture across the Americas. With more than two decades of corporate and independent media experience, including work in newspaper, radio, digital media, print magazine, photography, media relations, and documentary film, Díaz applies this professional knowledge to both her academic and consulting work in order to develop practical, yet empirically grounded solutions. She is the author of two books: P FKN R: How Bad Bunny Became the Global Voice of Puerto Rican Resistance (co-authored with Petra Rivera-Rideau, Duke University Press 2026) and the award-winning Manufacturing Celebrity: Latino Paparazzi and Women Reporters in Hollywood (Duke University Press 2020). She is also the co-creator of the Bad Bunny Syllabus and the director and producer of the award-winning documentary film Cuban HipHop: Desde el Principio (independent 2006). As a journalist, she has published in such outlets as the New York Times, Rolling Stone, Washington Post, USA Today, Latina, and People magazine. She earned her PhD in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Michigan and is currently Associate Professor of Chicana/o/x and Latina/o/x Studies at Loyola Marymount University (LMU), where she teaches courses focused on race, intersectionality, media, activism, and the Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny. Prior to LMU, Díaz held academic positions at Dartmouth College, UCLA, Cal State Fullerton, University of Southern California (USC), University of Michigan, and the Smithsonian Institute’s National Museum of American History and National Portrait Gallery. Across these various institutions, she has taught such courses as “Bad Bunny and Resistance in Puerto Rico,” “Diversity and Racial Conflict,” “Media, Race, and Representations,” and “Critical Approaches to Media Production,” as well as delivered lectures and facilitated workshops on related topics within and outside of the academy. During her time at UCLA, Díaz co-authored the UCLA Bunche Center for African American Studies’ Fourth Annual “Hollywood Diversity Report”–a study that continually demonstrates both the ethical and fiscal importance of diversity in film and television. At UCLA, she also co-founded Hate Crime Map, a user-generated digital mapping site that tracked hate crimes and harassment since the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Díaz has authored editorials focused on race, language, gender, music and pop culture. Her commentary has been featured in such outlets as the Associated Press, NPR, CNN, Reuters, PBS NewsHour, NBC News, The Atlantic, and the Los Angeles Times. She is able to provide necessary context to understand how and why particular cultural moments capture the American popular imagination, while simultaneously revealing the hidden gendered and racial struggles involved in the production of media. Díaz’s dynamic professional experiences have provided her with a unique set of tools that facilitate her ability to support artist, corporate and academic clients in reaching their full potential in areas of inclusivity.