Juan Flores is Professor of Latino Studies in the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis at New York University. His research interests focus on social and cultural theory, Latino and Puerto Rican studies, popular music, theory of diaspora and transnational communities, Afro-Latino culture. Professor Flores is the author of numerous books, including Divided Borders: Essays on Puerto Rican Identity (1993), From Bomba to Hip-Hop: Puerto Rican Culture and Latino Identity (2000), and The Diaspora Strikes Back: Caribeño Tales of Learning and Turning (2009). A co-founder and Chair of the afrolatin@ forum, he is the co-editor of The Afro-Latino Reader (2010). He was awarded the Casa de las Americas Prize in 1979 for his essay Insularismo e ideología burguesa, and again in 2009 for his book Bugalú y otros guisos: ensayos sobre culturas latinas en Estados Unidos.  In 2009 he was honored with the Latino Legacy award of the Smithsonian Institution. 

Ejima Baker-Morales is an artist and academic whose work focuses on popular culture, race, and gender. She is intensely interested in the multiplicity of black and Latin@ identities, their intersections, and the ways in which racial identities can be employed for political, economical, and cultural strength. She has a BA in Africana Studies and Music and a MA in Ethnomusicology and is working on her PhD in anthropology.  A board member of the afrolatin@ forum, when she is not teaching, her days are spent reading, singing, writing and researching.

Kwami Coleman is a Ph.D. candidate in musicology at Stanford University and a pianist, composer, and percussionist living in New York City. He attended the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music and Art and Performing Arts and went on to complete his undergraduate and graduate studies at Hunter College, CUNY. A founding member of the afrolatin@ forum, he is currently working on a dissertation on Miles Davis’s 1960s quintet and an EP of original music. 

Miguel López Jr. has devoted his brief professional career to working in the non-profit sector. He is especially interested in empowering underserved urban adolescents and in creating the conditions for effective dialogue between African Americans and Latin@s. A graduate of Long Island University, he is a counselor for the Learning to Work program in Harlem Renaissance HS, who finds inspiration in the work and words of Arturo Alfonso Schomburg, "It is the season for us to devote our time to kindling the torches that will inspire us to racial integrity."

Pablo José López Oro is a member of the afrolatin@ forum and an 8th grade Special Education teacher in Queens. He is the son of Garifuna Honduran immigrants, born and raised in Bushwick. Pablo José holds degrees in History, Latin American Studies, Community & Regional Planning, and Special Education. Has worked for the past two years as a Teach for America corps member in East Harlem at the Dual Language Middle School, Esperanza Preparatory Academy. He has previously conducted research in his maternal community of San Juan-Tela, Honduras focused on an ethnographic study of the Garifuna Feminist NGO, Enlace de Mujeres Negras de Honduras and is currently applying to PhD programs in History and/or Africana Studies to research the oral histories of transnational Garifuna migrants in New York City and Central America. 

Guesnerth Josúe Perea is a co-founder of AfroColombia NY, a non-profit organization which highlights the cultural contributions of AfroColombians to the Colombian national identity. Through his work and research with both AfroColombia NY and the afrolatin@ forum he has been a panelist on issues regarding Afro-Latinidad for the Inter-American Foundation, the National Urban League, and NAACP, among others and has presented his research on AfroColombian populations in various Universities. in July 2010, Josúe was named by the daily newspaper amNewYork as one of five Colombians "making a mark" in New York City. Josúe holds degrees in Latin American History and Theology.

Daphnie Sicre is a board member of the afrolatin@ forum and a Ph. D candidate on Educational Theatre in NYU. She holds a Bachelors of Art in Journalism, Theatre & History from Lehigh University, a Master's of Art in The Teaching of Social Studies from Columbia University-Teachers College, and Master's of Art in Educational Theatre from NYU. Daphnie is a performer, poet, teaching artist, social justice advocate, academic with experience on issues of Race, ethnicity & theatre, as well as Performance Studies. She also educates teachers on issues of Race, using theatre as a teaching tool and using theatre across the curriculum.

Yamila Sterling is a board member of the afrolatin@ forum and has worked for the "I Have a Dream" Foundation. Yamila holds a Bachelor's of Art in Sociology from Hunter College-CUNY and has expertise in Development on Youth Identity, self-esteem and leadership skills.

Tashima Thomas is a second year Ph.D. student at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in the Department of Art History. She is a Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellow conducting art historical research in the areas of Latin America and the Caribbean with a focus on the African Diaspora. She holds a BA and an MA in Art History from the University of Houston and San Diego State University respectively. She is particularly focused on understanding power relations as they relate to race, gender, and sexuality within neocolonial and postcolonial societies and how they inform the performativity and historicity of the Afro-Latina body, afrolatinidad, and cultural hybridization. Thomas’s work showcases another layer of diversity within art history by exploring intersections between Latin American Colonial studies, African Diaspora scholarship, and the visual arts. She has presented her research findings at numerous conferences including the Latin American Studies Association Congress, the National Association for Chicano Chicana Studies, the Popular Culture Association and the American Culture Association, and various research symposiums.

Melissa Valle is a sociology PhD student at Columbia University developing a project that seeks to deepen our understanding of the socio-spatial dimensions of exclusion in Latin America. Her current research explores the network bases of power and identity of Afro-Colombian social movement organizations. She served previously as a New York City Teaching Fellow on the Lower East Side and as a community development public policy director in Harlem. She holds a dual BA in economics and African-American studies from Howard University, an MPA in Public and Nonprofit Management and Policy from New York University and a Master of Science in education from Pace University.

Sisa Bueno is a filmmaker of Cuban and Dominican descent who is intrigued by both the complex and stories that are untold via a transmedia platform.  She studied film production at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University (NYU).  She also studied sociology, which helped develop her artistic vision of creating media projects that explore underrepresented cultures and social issues. She was a recipient of The Charles & Lucille King Family Foundation Award, and has completed various short documentary and fictional films including Journey into the Unknown, The Cello and The Breakdown, which had their respective film festival runs.  Sisa is currently developing a an interactive Afro-Latino online game, a fictional feature film, and she is also living between New York and La Paz, Bolivia while producing and directing a feature-length documentary entitled We of the Saya, an insightful and uplifting documentary that crosses four personal stories of Afro-Bolivians as a grassroots movement for their community to achieve recognition as a legitimate ethnic group is organized across the country.