RISE 2019 Conference

Catalina M. de Onís is an Assistant Professor in Willamette University’s Department of Civic Communication and Media in Salem, Oregon. She also holds affiliations with Latin American Studies and American Ethnic Studies. Her teaching and research focus on applied communication, environmental and health communication, energy colonialism, reproductive justice, coalitional politics, and instructional communication. Her essays appear in the Journal of Applied Communication Research, Communication Monographs, Communication Theory, Environmental Communication: A Journal of Nature and Culture, Women’s Studies in Communication, and Women & Language, as well as in several edited collections, including Racial Ecologies (University of Washington Press). Her research on energy colonialism and alternatives to extractivism composes the final chapter in the recently published open-access online book: Energy Democracy: A Research Agenda (https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/6005/energy-democracy). In collaboration with an interdisciplinary group of undergraduates, she organizes La Chispa, an environmental justice coalition on Willamette University’s campus (https://willamette.edu/cla/ccm/la-chispa/index.html) and also advises a communal resource hub, called the SOAR Center, which is home to a food pantry, clothing share, and books and other school supplies (https://willamette.edu/student-life/soar/index.html). She also is a contributing member of the Iniciativa de Eco Desarrollo de Bahía de Jobos (IDEBAJO), a grassroots group in Salinas, Puerto Rico, and has focused on supporting community solar power capacity building and infrastructure for energy and climate justice.