Mauricio Ortiz Rousset (he/him)

Dietrich College

Master of Arts in Literary and Cultural Studies

Hometown: Querétaro, México

1. Briefly describe the work you're doing in your program at CMU.

   My research interests revolve around representations of violence in México. My work in the program has focused on understanding, through the lens of cultural studies, how violence is experienced and unfolds in everyday and ordinary life. The projects I have developed within the program have approached this issue from legal, historical, decolonial, and literary perspectives, among others.

    

   A particularly influential experience has been the CMU Prison Education Project, an initiative that brings the classroom experience from CMU into nearby prisons. During the Spring 2025 semester, I took the course “The American Novel: Our World and Other Worlds” with Prof. Jeff Williams at SCI Somerset. I can say, without a doubt, that the incarcerated students have been the most dedicated and engaged classmates I’ve had the privilege of learning alongside.

2. How did you develop an interest in this area? 

   I had the good fortune of being born and raised in México. Over the past 20 years, the country has been immersed in a dramatic wave of violence. My generation grew up alongside the constant reproduction of images and sounds that represented a conflict whose causes were unclear, but whose consequences were unmistakably violent. At the same time, it’s very clear to me that México is not defined solely by violence, which is why I’m interested in understanding how the negotiation of conflict unfolds in different arenas—such as media representations or historical analyses.

3. What are your academic and/or professional goals? 

   Upon completing my master’s degree, I will begin a PhD in Communication Studies at McGill University. My goal is to undertake a research project that responds to the question: What does violence sound like? My proposed research seeks to use sound studies as a framework to analyze how violence is lived, remembered, and represented in Latin America, with a particular focus on México over the past 20 years.

    

   I aim to investigate how soundscapes mediate lived experience, collective memory, and the possibility of community resilience in the context of normalized mass violence. My goal is to deepen scholarly understanding of the intersection between violence and sound while contributing to critical analysis and social change.

4. How do you spend your time beyond academic work?

   Outside of academia, I’m a musician—I’ve been playing the drums since I was nine years old, and I also enjoy producing my own songs. I’m a football (soccer) fan too, so I also enjoy playing with my friends.