Daniela Castellanos credits UC Berkeley's Gender and Women's Studies Department with helping her find her voice.
Castellanos, who graduated from Cal last month with a bachelor's degree in Gender and Women's Studies and minors in human rights and Spanish, said growing up in a conservative environment and a traditional Mexican family exposed her to strict gender roles. She struggled to speak up for herself, and felt she let others walk all over her.
Majoring in Gender and Women's Studies empowered her to challenge these deeply ingrained barriers, creating a space for her to not only find herself, but discover the histories of other marginalized groups. She hopes to use this knowledge to help others as an attorney specializing in domestic and gender-based violence.
Berkeley Social Sciences spoke with Castellanos about her experiences at Gender and Women's Studies and the impact it had on her. This interview has been edited for clarity.
Why did you decide to major in Gender and Women's Studies (GWS)?
Daniela Castellanos: I decided to major in GWS after taking a junior college course called Women in Literature the summer before my senior year of high school. I fell in love with the content; it was the narratives and histories absent from the curriculum at my school in Cameron Park, a small town northeast of Sacramento.
These stories resonated with my voice, interests and identity — an unfamiliar and immensely refreshing recognition. So, when applying to universities, I immediately knew that GWS was my path, and it has proven to be immensely transformative and powerful.
Can you please provide specific examples of how UC Berkeley's GWS Department helped you find your voice?
Daniela Castellanos: I always had a passion for feminist struggles and advocacy, even while growing up in a conservative environment. But, for a while, I felt lost, struggling to find meaningful ways of articulating this unfolding passion in ways that could be heard, seen and understood. So, instead, I stayed silent, hiding in its safety. I let others speak over me and for me. I was told I was not intelligent enough and had one role: domesticity.
GWS changed this for me. I no longer allowed myself to be walked over; I began understanding that my voice had value. GWS gave me the tools to break down the gendered and imposed identities through knowledge and collective struggle. By creating a space and empowering me with theories, knowledge and histories, GWS allowed me to fill in the puzzle pieces of my identity, my ancestors and the people whose land I now call home. I found a community engaged in deep empathy, curiosity, anger, respect and profound intelligence within GWS. For the first time, I was in a room full of like-minded individuals, who expressed unmatched care for my voice and those of marginalized individuals globally.
What did you learn as a Cal GWS major?
Daniela Castellanos: GWS revolutionized my understanding of societal structures, histories and my own positionality within them. I encountered and engaged with various concepts, such as social construction and intersectionality, and heard the histories of marginalized groups, including the brutal oppression of enslaved peoples; the birth and consequences of the eugenic movement; the histories of genocides; the forced sterilizations of black and brown bodies; the revolving door of mass incarceration; and countless others. It was the stories scraped and strategically torn from our official history books, yet lurking in the tears, screams and shadows of our history and our present.
I gained insight into the ways that various oppressions are rooted in gendered, sexist and racist lenses that are produced and utilized by systems of power. I came to see that the silence I lived in was systematically imposed on many people who looked and thought like me. I came to learn that often, the silenced stories are the most important. I realized that you and I, alike, are the fuse of change and knowledge-making, whose voices and thoughts form the root of our power.
Which GWS faculty members inspired you the most?
Daniela Castellanos: I have deeply appreciated every professor I have had the honor of learning from, and one in particular is GWS Lecturer Brooke Lober. Her passion, love and deep care for her students and the material we study are made vividly clear in her classes and activism, which has been truly inspirational. I admire her passion and dedication to harm reduction, human rights and community building. Her classes have endowed me with invaluable knowledge, awareness and understanding, and taught me how to engage in change-making and channel passion — and at times, feelings of despair and hopelessness — into community activism.
Tell us about your experiences working with GWS Professor Paola Bacchetta, who is the new GWS chair.
Daniela Castellanos: Professor Bacchetta is one of my favorite professors. Her course, GWS 195: Gender and Sexuality in the Right Wing, was one of my most memorable at UC Berkeley. Professor Bacchetta's passion and expertise in the material created a phenomenally engaging class environment and community. She engaged deeply with our thoughts and voices with care, respect and interest, which was apparent in our class discussions and chats outside of class.
She was the first person to make me realize that my opinions and voice were undeniably valuable and that I was capable of producing meaningful scholarly work. She encouraged myself and fellow students to publish our research findings, and is currently supporting us in the publishing process. I am eternally grateful for her enthusiasm and commitment to guiding us on our academic journeys. I have no doubt that she will be a magnificent GWS chair.
How will a degree from GWS help you in your career pursuits?
Daniela Castellanos: I aspire to become an attorney specializing in domestic and gender-based violence cases. My degree in GWS provides me with a thorough understanding of the gendered dynamics and power imbalances that produce environments for this violence to flourish and be invisibilized, institutionalized and normalized. A GWS analytical perspective has allowed me to see our world as saturated with complexity, never consisting of clear-cut boundaries of either black or white, but instead, existing in the gray, muddled and complicated areas. This understanding is essential to comprehend the deeper-rooted problems, motivations and implications of violence, crime, the law and punishment that are built upon gendered foundations.
What is your advice to Berkeley students who are considering becoming a GWS major?
Daniela Castellanos: I advise others at Cal to major in GWS because it equips you with invaluable and interdisciplinary knowledge, which is often missing in other fields of study. GWS is a major with extraordinary professors and class environments that genuinely care about their students' diverse perspectives and change-making for a more equitable and universally free future.
This major allows you to understand your position within society and the value of that positionality. This field pushes you to think beyond yourself, urging you to witness the muted histories and voices that must be heard. It allows us to imagine a different future of true justice and peace, informing us of ways to reach these worlds by centering our shared humanity and interconnection.
