Nicolás Kanellos, Ph.D.

Brown Foundation Professor of Hispanic Studies
Director of Arte Público Press and Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage

Office hours: by appointment
Phone: (713) 743-3128

Nicolás Kanellos has been professor at the University of Houston since 1980.  He is founding publisher of the noted Hispanic literary journal The Americas Review (formerly Revista Chicano-Riqueña) and the nation’s oldest and most esteemed Hispanic publishing house, Arte Público Press.  Arte Público Press is the largest, non-profit publisher of literature in the United States.

Recognized for his scholarly achievement, Dr. Kanellos is the recipient of the 1996 Denali Press Award of the American Library Association, the 1989 American Book Award--Publisher/Editor Category, and the 1988 Hispanic Heritage Award for Literature presented by the White House, as well as various fellowships and other recognitions.  His monograph, A History of Hispanic Theater in the United States: Origins to 1940 (1990), received three book awards, including that of the Southwest Council on Latin American Studies. His latest book, Hispanic Immigrant Literature: El Sueño del Retorno (2011), won the PEN Southwest Award for Non-Fiction.

Dr. Kanellos is the director of a major national research program, Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Heritage of the United States, whose objective is to identify, preserve, study and make accessible hundreds of thousands of documents written in those regions that have become the United States from the colonial period to 1960.  In 1994, President Bill Clinton appointed Dr. Kanellos to the National Council on the Humanities.  In 1996, he became the first Brown Foundation Professor of Hispanic Studies at the University of Houston. In 2008, he was elected to the Spanish American Royal Academy of Literature, Arts and Sciences.

Education

Teaching and Research Interests

• Hispanic literature and theater of the United States
• Research methods

Publications

• Hispanic Immigrant Literature: El Sueño del Retorno. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2011. Winner, the PEN Southwest Award for Non-Fiction.
• Encyclopedia of Latino Literature. (Editor and author of 1/3 of the entries.) Westport, CN: Greenwood Press, pub date in 2008.
• Hispanic Literature of the United States: A Comprehensive Reference. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2004.
• Herencia: The Anthology of Hispanic Literature of the United States.  (General Editor) New York:  Oxford University Press, 2002.
• En otra voz: antología de la literatura hispana de los Estados Unidos. (Director General) Houston: Arte Público Press, 2002.
• Noche Buena: Hispanic American Christmas Stories.  (Editor/Compiler) New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
• Hispanic Periodicals in the United States: A Brief History and Comprehensive Bibliography.  Houston: Arte Público Press, 2000.
• Thirty Million Strong: Reclaiming the Hispanic Image in U.S. History.  Golden, CO: Fulcrum Press, 1998.
• Hispanic Firsts.  Detroit:  Gale Research Inc., 1997.
• The Hispanic Literary Companion. Detroit: Visible Ink Press, 1996. (Compiler and Editor of this reference anthology).
• Chronology of Hispanic American History.  Detroit:  Gale, 1995.
• Hispanic American Chronology, edited with Bryan Ryan.  Detroit:  Gale Research Inc., 1995.
• Hispanic American Literature (Editor).  New York:  HarperCollins, Inc., 1995.
• With Claudio Esteva Fabregat, general editors, Handbook of Hispanic Cultures in the United States.  4 vols. (Houston and Madrid:  Instituto de Cooperación Iberoamericana and Arte Público Press, 1994).
• The Hispanic American Almanac:  A Reference Work on Hispanics in the United States (Editor and Author of 40% of Chapters).  Detroit:  Gale Research, Inc., 1993 [4 editions to 2004].
• Short Fiction by U.S. Hispanic Authors (Editor).  Houston:  Arte Público Press, 1993. 
• A History of Hispanic Theatre in the United States:  Origins to 1940.  Austin: University of Texas Press, 1990. 
• Biographical Dictionary of Hispanic Literature in the United States (Editor). West­port, CT:  Greenwood Press, 1989.
• Hispanic Bibliography.  Momence, IL:  Baker & Taylor, 1988.
• Mexican American Theatre: Legacy and Reality.  Pittsburgh: Latin American Review Press, 1987.
• Hispanic Theater in the United States (Editor).   Houston: Arte Público Press, 1985.
• Daniel Venegas, Las aventures de Don Chipote, ed. and introd. by Nicolás Kanellos (Mexico: SEP & CEFNOMEX, 1984).  An unknown novel of his­torical and literary value discovered
  and edited by Professor Kanellos. Re-issued in English with new introduction, Arte
  Público Press, 2000. Re-issued, with new introduction, in Spanish, Mexico City: Plaza y Valdez, 2001.
• Mexican American Theater:  Then and Now (Editor).  Houston: Arte Público Press, 1983.
• Latino Short Fiction, ed. Luis Dávila and Nicolás Kanellos.  Gary, Indiana: Arte Público
  Press, 1980.
• Nuevos Pasos: Chicano and Puerto Rican Drama, eds. Nicolás Kanellos and Jorge Huerta.  Gary, Indiana: Arte Público Press 1979/2nd edition, Houston, 1989.
• Plus more than 100 articles in journals and chapters in books.