Sofi Chavez is the César Chávez Predoctoral Fellow in the Department of Latin American, Latino, and Caribbean Studies. Chavez works at the intersections of queer, critical race, and childhood studies in twentieth-century and contemporary American literature and culture. Her dissertation, "Visceral Encounters: Strategies for Entering and Leaving Queer Latinx Childhood" explores how Latinx authors queer the Bildungsroman genre by structuring the novel's form around "visceral encounters" between the child and the world outside. Her first book project will expand on this work to consider the figure of the queer Latinx child in U.S. culture more broadly. Chavez's research has been supported by the Institute for Citizens & Scholars. 

After receiving her PhD from the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley in Spring 2025, Chavez will continue at Dartmouth as the César Chávez Postdoctoral Fellow. Her teaching interests include queer theory, gender and sexuality studies, ethnic U.S. literature, media studies, and popular culture.