BIOGRAPHY:

Dr. Carlos E. Cortés is a Professor Emeritus of History at the University of California, Riverside.  Since 1990 he has served on the summer faculty of the Harvard Institutes for Higher Education, while he is also on the faculties of the Summer Institute for Intercultural Communication and the Federal Executive Institute and has served as a Smithsonian Institution public lecturer.

 

A consultant to many government agencies, school systems, universities, mass media, private businesses, and other organizations, Cortés has lectured widely throughout the United States, Latin America, Europe, Asia, and Australia on the implications of diversity for education, government, business, and media.  He also lectures on cruise ships, where he speaks on such cross-cultural topics as gestures, the history of time, and cultural conceptions of space.

 

Cortés has served as Scholar-in-Residence with Univision Communications and as Creative/Cultural Advisor for Nickelodeon's Peabody-award-winning children's television series, "Dora the Explorer," and its sequels, "Go, Diego, Go!" and “Dora and Friends: Into the City.”  For his Nickelodeon contributions he received the 2009 NAACP Image Award.  He also travels the country performing his one-person autobiographical play, A Conversation with Alana: One Boy's Multicultural Rite of Passage.

 

His recent books include The Children Are Watching: How the Media Teach about Diversity, The Making -- and Remaking -- of a Multiculturalist, and his memoir, Rose Hill: An Intermarriage before Its Time.  He also edited the four-volume Multicultural America: A Multimedia Encyclopedia and has completed his first novel, Scouts’ Honor.

 

Cortés’ has received numerous honors, including honorary doctorates, the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators' Outstanding Contribution to Higher Education Award, the California Association for Bilingual Education's Inspiration Award, the Distinguished California Humanist Award, the American Society for Training and Development's National Multicultural Trainer of the Year Award, and the California Council for the Social Studies' Hilda Taba Award.  While at the University of California, Riverside, he received the campus’ Distinguished Teaching Award, Faculty Public Service Award, and  Emeritus Professor of the Year Award.  In 2016, the City of Riverside, California, established the annual Carlos E. Cortés Award for community service that fosters inclusivity and diversity.