Rosaura Sánchez is professor of Chicano and Latin American Literature at the University of California, San Diego. Born and raised in San Angelo, Texas, Professor Sánchez received her PhD in romance linguistics from the University of Texas, and joined the Department of Literature at UCSD in 1972, a department she has now served for nearly fifty years. She is widely considered one of the earliest contributors to the field of Chicana/o literature and has explored the issues of race and gender extensively in a variety of literary forms. She is the author of numerous publications in the field of Chicana/o studies and literature, including: "Essays on La Mujer" (1977); Chicano Discourse: Socio-historic Perspectives (1983); "Postmodernism and Chicano Literature" (1987); "The History of Chicanas: Proposal for a Materialist Perspective" (1990); "Discourses of Gender, Ethnicity, and Class in Chicano Literature" (1992); Telling Identities: The Californio Testimonios (1995); and "Deconstructions and Renarrativizations: Trends in Chicana Literature" (1996). She is also the editor of the selected works of Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton, as well as the author of two fiction collections: He Walked in and Sat Down, and Other Stories (2000); and Lunar Braceros: 2125-2148 (2009). In this interview, Professor Sánchez discusses: her family background and upbringing; her educational journey from high school to UT Austin; her service in the Peace Corps; her activism and observations regarding race and civil rights in Texas; her graduate experience at UT Austin as a Chicana; joining the faculty at UCSD and establishing herself in the profession; her reflections on the state of Chicana/o studies and how the field evolved over her career; the aims and contributions of her scholarship in the field; the reception of Chicana/o studies at UCSD and in the academy; as well as her thoughts on important works, themes, and high points in the field's development over the last fifty years.