¡Hola! My name is Bremda Acosta and I’m an upcoming senior at New York University in the College of Arts and Sciences. I’m majoring in Sociology and Global Public Health with a minor in Spanish. I was born in the Dominican Republic but I moved to New York City at the age of 12. Even though my academic interests at NYU have ranged from psychology and child mental health studies to social cultural studies, I was finally able to find my niche in sociology. The sociological imagination has helped to make sense of my positionality as a woman, a Hispanic immigrant and a first generation college student. More specifically, I was drawn to sociological research because I occupy spaces that have systematically excluded people like myself in the past and that still may lack the tools for my academic success.
This summer, I’m doing an internship as a Gallatin Global Fellow in Urban Practice in Madrid, Spain. I’m working with Latin American migrant women who are domestic workers in this city and who have come together to learn about their rights, visibilize their community and to empower themselves. They created an organization called “Servicio Domestico Activo” (SEDOAC– Active Domestic Service) that organizes workshops, festivals and meetings to get more women in this informal labor sector involved in their work. I’m also working with sociology professor, Jose Manuel Robles, at la Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM) in organizing the methodology of my research.
