Assistant Professor | 21st Century Academic Leader
luisj.cintron@sagrado.edu
Luis Javier Cintrón-Gutiérrez is an Assistant Professor and Academic Leader of XNUMXst Century Skills at Universidad del Sagrado Corazón. He holds a Ph.D. in Latin American, Caribbean, and Latinx Studies from the University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY). He also holds a master's degree in Sociology from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus (UPRRP), and another in Media and Contemporary Culture from the Ferré Rangel School of Communication at Sagrado. He obtained his bachelor's degree in Political Science from the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez Campus (UPRM).
His research addresses narco-culture, marginality, symbolic mediations, and urban experiences in the contemporary and transnational Hispanic Caribbean. He is the author of the book The Standing Dead Man: Wakes, marginality and performance in contemporary Puerto Rico (Ediciones del Flamboyán, 2025), which examines death, spectacle and representation in Puerto Rican narcoculture from an ethnographic, sociological and cultural studies framework.
He has mentored several undergraduate research projects in the A Culture of Research Achievement (CoRA-S) program at Sagrado's Center for Academic Research. He has taught in the Departments of Latin American, Caribbean, and Latinx Studies in the United States, as well as in the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at the University at Albany, and in the Department of Sociology at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. He also served as a research assistant at the Center for Social Research (UPRRP), the Center for Applied Social Research (UPRM), and the Interdisciplinary Center for Coastal Studies (UPRM) during her undergraduate and graduate studies.
Currently, he serves as co-chair of the Culture, Power and Politics section of the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) for the period 2025–2027 and is a member of the Seminar on Violence and Complexity at UPRRP.
Recent publications:
Cintrón-Gutiérrez, Luis J. 2025. The Standing Dead Man: Wakes, marginality and performance in contemporary Puerto RicoSan Juan: Flamboyan Editions. https://edicionesdelflamboyan.com/collections/libros/products/el-muerto-parao
Cintrón-Gutiérrez, Luis J. 2024. “Yo siempre quise ser bichote” in “P FKN R”: Bad Bunny and the Representation of Puerto Rican Narco-Culture in the Gore Capitalism Era. In Contraband Cultures: Reframing Smuggling Across Latin America, edited by J. Cearns and C. Beach. London: UCL Press. https://doi.org/10.14324/111.9781800087262
Cintrón-Gutiérrez, Luis J. 2023. Para'o: Exotic Wake, Extreme Performance and Marginality in San Juan, Puerto Rico. In On Extremity: Sounds, Images, Words, and Experiences, edited by N. Varas-Díaz, N. Scott, and B. Bardine. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.
Cintrón Gutiérrez, Luis J. (2022). “Internet Memes and Representation of Contemporary Puerto Rican Cities: The Case of Bayamón as a NarcoCity.” Art and Identity Politics, 26(26), 50-66. https://revistas.um.es/reapi/article/view/529991
Cintrón-Gutiérrez, Luis J. 2020. “Tepito and Mexico City from the 'third space' of Ingobernable.”Middle Atlantic Review of Latin American Studies, 4(1):142–158. https://doi.org/10.23870/marlas.231