Dr. Sonja Stephenson Watson is Director of the Women's & Gender Studies Program and Associate Professor of Spanish at the University of Texas at Arlington. She received her Ph.D. in Hispanic Literature from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. Her areas of specialty are Afro-Panamanian Literature, Hispanic Caribbean Literature, and reggae en español. Dr. Watson has published articles in the Afro-Hispanic Review, Cincinnati Romance Review, the College Language Association Journal, the Latin American and Caribbean Ethnic Studies Journal, PALARA, Callaloo, Hispania and alter/nativas. Her manuscript, The Politics of Race in Panama: Afro-Hispanic and West Indian Literary Discourses of Contention (University Press of Florida 2014) deals with the forging of Afro-Panamanian identity.

• 2005 - PhD in Modern Languages(Spanish), University of Tennessee
• 2000 - MA in Spanish, University of Tennessee
• 1995 - BA in Spanish, College of William and Mary