University of Wisconsin Affiliations: Chicanx/e & Latinx/e Studies; Faculty Affiliate of Latin America, Carribean, and Iberian Studies
Current and Future Projects:
• Examining Quinceañeras/Quinceañeridades in contemporary popular culture
• Situating Spanish Language television and TelevisaUnivision within larger conversations about media mergers
• Latinx/e Digital Audiences as critical agents within media production ecosystems
• Ongoing research on corporate social responsibility reports and the role that DEI plays within these
• Democratic Violence in Latin America and its relationship to U.S. contexts
• Girl Culture: Past and Present
Expertise and Activities:
My research and teaching center on critical media and cultural studies, with a focus on Latinx/e media and popular culture, girlhood, media industries, and transnational feminisms. I examine how media both reflect and reinforce social inequalities, as well as how marginalized communities challenge these narratives—often through digital platforms. In particular, my work investigates the global representation of girls of color in the post-network digital era, situating these portrayals within contemporary postfeminist and neoliberal frameworks.
I am a leader and developer of the subfield of Latina girls’ media studies. My award-winning book Elena, Princesa of the Periphery: Disney’s Flexible Latina Girl (Rutgers University Press, 2023), combines a critique of postfeminism, intersectional analysis, an exploration of girlhood studies, TV and film studies, theme park ethnographies, digital studies, advertising and promotional cultural analysis, political economy, and ethnic and cultural studies analysis.
I am also the co-editor (with Jillian M. Báez and Angharad N. Valdivia) of Quinceañeras: Latinidades and Girlhood in Popular Culture (University of Illinois Press, 2026). This interdisciplinary collection examines the mediated dimensions of the quinceañera—from production and representation to audience reception and commodification. The collection emphasizes transnational, comparative, intergenerational, and gender-fluid perspectives, contributing to broader conversations about Latinx identity, cultural expression, media industries, and representation.
Education:
• Ph.D. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2020
• M.A. University of New Mexico, 2013
• B.A. Southwestern University, 2010
Honors/Awards:
• National Communication Association’s Critical and Cultural Studies Division New Investigator Award, 2025
• Faculty Senate Excellence in Research Pre-Tenure Award, University of South Florida, 2025
• Department of Communication HUB Award for Contributions to MA Students’ Success, University of South Florida, 2025
• Book of the Year Award, Critical and Cultural Communication Studies Division (CCSD), National Communication Association (NCA), 2025
• Book of the Year Award, Latina/Latino Communication Studies Division and La Raza Caucus, National Communication Association (NCA), 2025
• Humanities Institute Faculty Fellowship, University of South Florida, 2024-2025
• Bonnie Ritter Award for Outstanding Feminist Book, National Communication Association (NCA), 2024
• Top Paper Award, Latina/o Communication Studies Division, National Communication Association (NCA), 2024
• Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award, University of South Florida, 2021-2022
• Outstanding Dissertation Award, Critical Cultural Studies Division, National Communication Association (NCA), 2020
• Latinx Congratulatory Graduate Student Leadership Award, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, 2020
• University of Illinois Distinguished Fellowship, University of Illinois Urbana- Champaign, 2015-2018
• Outstanding Master’s Student Award, Department of Communication and Journalism, University of New Mexico, 2013
Books:
• Elena, Princesa of the Periphery: Disney’s Flexible Latina Girl. Rutgers University Press, 2023
• Quinceañeras: Latinidades and Girlhood in Popular Culture. Co-editor with Jillian M. Báez and Angharad N. Valdivia. University of Illinois Press, 2026
Articles:
• Leon-Boys, D. (2025). Mediated Quinceañeras as Resistive Embodied Performance: The Continuum of Quinceañeridad and the Public Sphere. Quarterly Journal of Speech.
• Galarza, L. & Leon-Boys, D. (2023). Young Jane as Citizen-in-Transition: Analyzing Girlhood and Citizenship in Jane the Virgin. Communication and Race. 1(1), 1-19.
• Leon-Boys, D. & Bucciferro, C. (2023). The Teenage Latina Genius on Television: Netflix’s Ashley Garcia. Women’s Studies in Communication, 46(1), 87-107.
• Leon-Boys, D. (2021). Disney’s Specific and Ambiguous Princess: A Discursive Analysis of Elena of Avalor. Girlhood Studies, 14(2), 29-45.
• Leon-Boys, D. (2021). No Spanish in Cinderella’s Kingdom: A Situated Ethnography of Disney World’s Engagement with Elena of Avalor. Departures in Critical Qualitative Research 10(2), 50-58.
• Leon-Boys, D. & Chávez, C. (2021). Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge as Postcolonial Fantasy: Disney, Labor, and the Renegotiation of Border Discourses. International Journal of Communication. 15(0). 2378-2396.
• Leon-Boys, D. & Valdivia, A.N. (2021). The Location of US Latinidad: Stuck in the Middle, Disney and the in-between Ethnicity. Journal of Children and Media, 15(2). 218-232.
Book Chapters:
• Leon-Boys, D. (2026). Deterritorialized Industrial Trans Latinidad: The Three Realms of Disney’s Transnational Eternal Foreigners. In S. Eguchi & J. Kwon (Eds.) The Routledge Handbook of Communication and Transnationalism, Routledge.
• Leon-Boys, D. (2026). A Plastic Cultural Celebration: The Quinceañera for All Ages. In Báez, J., Leon-Boys, D., and Valdivia, A.N. (Eds.). Quinceañeras: Latinidades & Girlhood in Popular Culture.
• Leon-Boys, D. (2024). Looking Forward: The Future of Girls’ Studies. In S. Mazzarella (Ed.) Routledge Companion to Girls’ Studies (RCGS) (pp. 104- 114). U.K.: Routledge.
• Leon-Boys, D. Rivera, M., & Valdivia, A.N. (2022) Media and Minority Children. In D. Lemish (Ed.) Routledge International Handbook of Children, Adolescents, and Media (pp. 355-362). U.K.: Routledge.
• Leon-Boys, D. (2019). A Latina Captain: Decentering Latinidad through Audience Constructions in Dexter. In Hernandez, L., Bowen, D., De Los Santos- Upton, S, & Martinez, A. (Eds.) Latina/o/x Communication Studies: Theories, Methods, and Practice (pp. 137-159). Maryland: Lexington Books.
• Leon-Boys, D., & Kristensen, M. (2018). Race, Cyborgs, and the Pitfalls of Biopolitical Discourse in Black Mirror’s “Men Against Fire.” In A. Cirucci & B. Vackery (Eds.) Black Mirror and Critical Media Theory (pp. 3-14). Maryland: Lexington Books.
• Johnson, J. R., Gonzalez, M., Ray, C., Hager, J., Leon, D., Spalding, S., & Brigham, T. (2011). Daring Pedagogy: Dialoguing about Intersectionality and Social Justice. In S.M. Pliner & C.A. Banks (Eds.) Teaching, Learning, and Intersecting Identities in Higher Education (pp. 179-200). New York, NY: Peter Lang Publishers.