From Object to Subject: The Transatlantic Migration of Esperanza Rodríguez

May 28, 2026, 7 PM at The Philosophical Research Society

In this Illuminated Lecture from theatre dybbuk, UCLA PhD candidate and poet Rachel Kaufman takes us on a journey from the archives of the Spanish and Mexican Inquisitions to a home in Mexico City in the 1600s. In this home lived Esperanza Rodríguez – the daughter of a crypto-Jewish father and an enslaved West African mother – who had been brought across the Atlantic from Seville by her conversa owner, Catalina Enríquez, before eventually gaining her freedom. Inspired by the form of the Talmud, Kaufman places archived objects and documents from Esperanza and Catalina  – both of whom were tried by the Inquisition – in conversation with one another, alongside her own responses to the archive. Through Esperanza's story, we learn about the gendered aspects of the Inquisition, the biases of archives, the experiences of Jewish mixed-race women within the Spanish casta system, and the complexities of oppression and kinship within colonial structures.

Tickets are $15 and can be purchased through Eventbrite.