Dance and the Hollywood Latina asks why every Latina star in Hollywood history, from Dolores Del Rio in the 1920s to Jennifer Lopez in the 2000s, began as a dancer or danced onscreen. While cinematic depictions of women and minorities have seemingly improved, a century of representing brown women as natural dancers has popularized the notion that Latinas are inherently passionate and promiscuous. Yet some Latina actresses became stars by embracing and manipulating these stereotypical fantasies.

Introducing the concepts of "inbetween-ness" and "racial mobility" to further illuminate how racialized sexuality and the dancing female body operate in film, Priscilla Peña Ovalle focuses on the careers of Dolores Del Rio, Rita Hayworth, Carmen Miranda, Rita Moreno, and Jennifer Lopez. Dance and the Hollywood Latina helps readers better understand how the United States grapples with race, gender, and sexuality through dancing bodies on screen.

PRISCILLA PEÑA OVALLE is an assistant professor of film and media studies at the University of Oregon.

"What a wonderful project! This book magnificently centerstages how dance in Hollywood constitutes a cultural space in which Latina stars turn their performance into the ultimate expression of/for agency and empowerment. Let the rhythm take you over! Go girls!"

"A good resource for those interested in dance, film, and media studies and in gender, race and sexualities studies. Recommended."

"A well-researched, engaging book that expands our understanding of the shaping of the Hollywood Latina, and of Latinas in the national imaginary, through analysis of dance and embodiment in these dynamics."

"In this fresh examination, Priscilla Peña Ovalle convincingly probes the racial dynamics and sexual politics that shape the paradoxical figure of the dancing Hollywood Latina."