Founder and Lead
Adela C Licona, Founder / Lead Consultant & Coach, The Art of Change Agency
I am an award-winning writer, teacher, artist, and mentor. I am curious. Creative and analytic. I love to: brainstorm, collaborate, think, and act on dreams and new ideas. I bring 20 years experience in higher education in the fields of rhetoric, professional communication, and women and gender studies. I have studied organizational communication, participated in shared leadership in feminist and community-based organizations, and consulted justice-oriented organizations and grant-funded collaborations. In my capacities as a writer, editor, activist, organizational leader, and artist, I have been involved in innovative collaborations for change in the academy and in community.
As an interdisciplinary scholar, I authored Zines in Third Space: Radical Cooperation and Borderlands Rhetorics (Suny, 2012) and co-edited Precarious Rhetorics (Ohio State Press, 2018) as well as Feminist Pedagogy: Looking Back to Move Forward (Johns Hopkins Press, 2009). I have chaired dozens of dissertations, taught undergraduate and graduate courses, collaborated on critical and creative projects for change, and offered community workshops.
My multimedia and photographic art has been exhibited internationally and across the US and published as book covers, in journals, and in magazines. Working through the principles of what I term “art as coalitional gesture,” I have developed participatory art projects as community interventions and as acts of solidarity. I serve on the Board of Directors for Arts+Feminism, BorderLinks, and the Primavera Foundation, am Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Arizona, and Editor Emeritus of Feminist Formations.
Let’s connect!
adelaartofchange [at] gmail [dot] com
Awards & Recognition
Adela C. Licona was selected to receive the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition, CFSHRC, 2019-20 Lisa Ede Mentoring Award.
In keeping with award expectations, Professor Licona (the first ever Latinx/Chicanx scholar-mentor to receive this award) is being recognized for a career record of distinguished feminist mentorship in both formal and informal educational settings, including (but not limited to) academic departments and programs, writing and community centers, and professional and community organizations. Adela not only embodies the spirit of the Coalition's commitment to the care and collaboration involved in mentoring but is being recognized for having enriched and even expanded that definition through her example.
What People Say of My Work
“I see Adela as connecting people and things to create transformation. I think of Adela’s mode of creating connections for transformation as being based on smart analysis, insight, and ability to allow for rather than ignore or erase complexities—while bringing everything together nonetheless.”
“Across projects, Adela’s approach to her work is defined by her attentive precision but also infused with joy.”
“As an internationally recognized scholar and artist, Adela Licona brings an inspirational intellect, an infectious energy, and an imaginative spirit to every collaboration.”
“I would describe Adela’s work as collaborative, revolutionary, feminist, creative, supportive, exploratory, open, flexible, innovative…She is inspirational to others, and helps them think anything is possible.”