top of page
WELCOME
Thank you for taking an interest in me and my work. I am a historian and writer. My work is rooted in the places that have shaped me, the communities and movements I have been part of, and the questions I later explored through archives and historical research.
My books move between Tucson and Los Angeles, and my newest work extends that journey into Sonora, Mexico. Across these places, I examine contested landscapes, urban renewal and displacement, environmental justice, Brown and queer histories, LGBTQIA+ activism, and the ways communities resist being erased.
LIVED EXPERIENCE
%20-%20Lower%20Resolution.jpg)
.jpg)
Lived experience is at the center of my memoirs. In writing about my own past, I incorporate documents, newspapers, oral histories, photographs, government records, and archival research. My memoirs are also footnoted.
I consider my lived experience the primary form of historical evidence in my memoirs. I believe they can reveal things the documentary record cannot or overlooks, which is why I consider my memoirs works of history.
EXPLORE
SELECTED RECOGNITION & COOL THINGS
Proud to report!
Storied Property: María Cordova’s Casa
received the 2026 Independent Publisher Book Awards Gold Medal for West-Mountain Non-Fiction.
Watch this 8 minute video, made by University of Arizona film students, as I take you on a personal journey through Barrio Viejo—one of Tucson’s oldest and most diverse neighborhoods. I share family stories and reflect on urban renewal in the 1960s, as well as the current gentrification taking hold in the barrio today.
I was a queer activist in Los Angeles from 1979 through the early 1990s. I was most active in Gay and Lesbian Latinos Unidos (GLLU), serving as the group’s president from 1988 to 1990. More than three decades later, I joined six other former members to tell that story in the PBS documentary Unidad: Gay & Lesbian Latinos Unidos. Make sure to watch it on PBS while it is still available.
Photo of me carrying the Gay & Lesbian Latinos Unidos banner at 1986 L.A. PRIDE.
L.A. Interchanges: A Brown & Queer Memoir
was recently reviewed in Pacific Historical Review.
The review appears in the May 2026 issue.
It means a great deal to see my memoir, grounded in queer life and brown Los Angeles histories, discussed within a major academic history journal. Read it here.
BOOKS | EVENTS | ABOUT LYDIA OTERO | CONTACT
bottom of page