Puerto Ricanstruction: Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez

Puerto Ricanstruction: Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez

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Each Monday, during the 2018 hurricane season, Worldview presents a series called Puerto Ricanstruction. Three million American citizens on Puerto Rico still face catastrophe, many months after Hurricane Maria devastated the island. Experts predict just a “Category One” storm could wipe out power on the entire island for months. For this series, we’ll discuss post-Maria life in Puerto Rico, and issues of import to the people there, and to Chicago’s Puerto Rican Diaspora. This week, we chat with Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez , a “Nuyorican” (New York and Puerto Rican) writer and graphic designer. He created the Puerto Rican character “La Borinqueña”, an Afro-Boricua heroine. Miranda-Rodriguez has teamed up with DC Comics to feature La Borinqueña in the new anthology, Ricanstruction: Reminiscing and Rebuilding Puerto Rico. La Borinqueña teams up with DC comic book favorites, including Wonder Woman, to rebuild Puerto Rico. Proceeds from the comic  will go towards hurricane recovery. Miranda-Rodriguez will discuss how his writing and characters reveal the nuance, and colonialist history of Puerto Rico, her people, and diaspora. He’ll also talk about the impact of comics books and media on representations of race and gender.