María Sofía Corona: Translation Services

Sofía is a native Spanish speaker. As she grew up in California’s Central Valley, she took part in programs for migrant students in public elementary schools where she received a bilingual English and Spanish education. As a child, she took on the task of translating legal and formal documents for family members; as she entered high school she continued to translate but increasingly for her broader migrant Spanish-speaking community. A high school Advanced Placement (AP) course in Spanish Literature allowed Sofia to expand her knowledge of the Spanish language and cultural meanings. Since then she has contributed her communication and translation skills to oral history projects, advocacy initiatives, and organizing efforts. As an undergraduate at California State University, Fresno, Sofia majored in History and Philosophy and minored in Spanish Literature with grammar training. Now a graduate student in History at the University of Texas at Austin, Sofia researches rural Mexico, agricultural modernization social movements, and migration from Mexico to the United States. She has learned to engage with academic texts from both the Spanish-speaking and English-speaking worlds. At the same time, her role as a community organizer keeps her familiar with diverse everyday-use Spanish and English dialects.

Sofia has worked with groups like M.E.Ch.A., Comite No Nos Vamos, E.S.P.I.N.O. (Schools Yes!, Jails No!), and Southwest Workers Union, as well as been part of grassroots coalitions. One major coalition was the greater Fresno area pro-migrante coalition formed to mobilize in and beyond the 2006 mass marches. She has presented both in Spanish and English on the history of migration to Mexico, and on the experience of a range of people, including Mexicans, Native Americans, Asians, and African Americans with industrial expansion, agricultural modernization, and migration in the U.S. at conferences and in classroom and community group workshops. The oral history projects Sofia is a part of or develops are a part of her support to organizing efforts. One of these major projects was Making Invisible Lives Visible: Farmworkers in the San Joaquin Valley, where she was an assistant researcher for three years and conducted interviews and transcription in both Spanish and English.

(biography 2008)