Manuel Cuellar

Manuel Ricardo Cuellar is associate professor of Latin American and Latinx Studies at The George Washington University. His research primarily engages questions of performance, especially as they concern dance, indigeneity, and Afro-mestizo imaginaries in Mexico, combining ethnographic fieldwork, archival research, and studies of contemporary and classical Nahuatl, Mexico’s most widely spoken and written Indigenous language. Cuellar’s strong background in Mexican traditional dance has led him to explore dance’s role in Mexican national identity, indigeneity, and queerness both in Mexico and the United States. He is the author of Choreographing Mexico: Festive Performances and Dancing Histories of a Nation (UT Press 2022), winner of the 2023 de la Torre Bueno First Book Award by the Dance Studies Association.