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CSUSB art professor discusses his involvement with the MexiCali Biennial art exhibition
Holtville Tribune
Sept. 30, 2021

Ed Gomez, an assistant professor of art at Cal State San Bernardino, discusses his involvement in the MexiCali Biennial cross-border art exhibition. Together with Luis Hernandez, an art instructor at Imperial Valley College and the San Diego State University-Imperial Valley Calexico campus, they have curated, along with others, four international biennials over the years and are now calling out to border-area artists to participate in a fifth biennial to take place in three locales between 2022 and 2023, including an as-yet unscheduled stop at Steppling Gallery in 2023.

In its broad concept and birth, the MexiCali Biennial started as a way to poke fun at the bloat that had infiltrated the international biennial movement in which the high-dollar art world had essentially lost its soul, or at least its footing on earth.

“MexiCali Biennial originally started as an art project conceived by myself and Luis. We settled on this as a way to critique the proliferation of international regional art biennials, and to play with the way the word biennial can change the context of an exhibition,” Gomez said recently.

Read the complete article at “MexiCali Biennial readies for fifth renewal.”

CSUSB criminal justice professor co-authors study, ‘Managing courtesy stigma: women and relationships with men in prison’
Criminal Justice Studies

Zachary A. Powell, assistant professor of criminal justice at California State University, San Bernardino, is one of the authors of a study that examined the “courtesy stigma” or “stigma by association” faced by those in romantic relationships with incarcerated partners.

The study’s abstract reads: “Using semi-structured interviews with 12 women involved in romantic relationships with men who were incarcerated, we explore whether they experienced courtesy stigma and if so, how they managed it. The women said they experienced courtesy stigma from others, including friends and family. In response, participants either avoided interactions with those they thought would judge them (by withholding information or severing ties) or by fully embracing the relationships (pointing to their benefits). These management techniques allowed participants to have a sense of agency in their decisions. Considering the importance of healthy relationships in promoting desistance from criminal behavior, examining the management of courtesy stigma from the perspective of the un-incarcerated partner may increase our understanding of these relationships on reentry.”

The study is posted online at “Managing courtesy stigma: women and relationships with men in prison.”

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