Life & Work with Natasha Rangel

Today we’d like to introduce you to Natasha Rangel.

Hi Natasha, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for sharing your story with us – to start, maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers.
My name is Natasha Rangel. I’m currently a third-year student in the Bilingual MFA of Creative Writing at the University of Texas at El Paso and one of the members of the editorial Board of Rio Grande Review (RGR), a student-run journal that showcases the works of writers and artists in and outside of the border El Paso – Ciudad Juárez. The journal has been around for more than twenty years. It allows graduate students in the program to develop editorial and publishing experience for a year (the Board changes each year). We are a non-profit organization, so we don’t charge anyone to acquire the journal, and there is no need to be part of UTEP to have someone’s pieces featured in our issues. RGR is a bilingual journal, we accept submissions in English and Spanish, and we understand bilingualism the same way we practice it at the program, that is, as the coexistence of both languages in the same space, inviting our readers to challenge themselves in the different approaches and ways to enjoy and study stories in each language. We don’t do translations. One of my goals as an editor for the year 2022-2023 was to push so we could include comics as part of the accepted submissions. Comics present a mix between art and storytelling, and I’ve always been curious about the way we can tell stories in different formats (video games, podcasts, audiobooks) aside from the more traditional practice that is mainly writing. So, the journal featured comics for the first time since it’s been around, bringing us together to a different community both in and outside of UTEP, which is excellent.

Would it have been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Being part of a student-run magazine means that you have to split your responsibilities between the journal, the classes at the MFA, and the teaching (I’m also a TA instructor of Intro to Creative Writing), so there were moments when I felt I was juggling with time. But I’m also a workaholic, so I value being occupied. That said, I’m proud to mention that as a team, we accomplished having at least six presentations in the US and Mexico; we teamed up with local bookstores for distribution, reached a diverse audience (meaning people from places such as Nigeria or Bulgaria) and even had a second-edition of an issue for the first time, that we know, in all the history of RGR.

Let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I have a bachelor’s degree in Literature and am interested in literary research and interactive fiction. I’m also obsessed with psychological and survival horror. I’m Venezuelan, so English is my second language, and it’s been interesting to set free my accent in a place like El Paso. I very much enjoy it. Also, being from a country going through a political and humanitarian crisis meant I had to do different jobs to survive. Luckily, many of my jobs included writing, which I love. I’ve worked as a journalist, copy editor, proofreader, editor, and community manager for organizations serving the community (urban activism and women’s rights are among them). As a graduate student, I’m working on my craft. I want to become a fiction writer, and currently, I’m researching the figure of the monster and the essence of the “monster” that lies within female characters in different authors. I’m fond of the “shadow” of the archetypes that allows someone to see the dark and most vulnerable parts of the self, and I would like to flesh out that in my stories.

Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
Well, my colleagues Israel Terron Holtzeimer (Senior Editor and Designer of RGR) and Germán Barrera Toro (Editor and Project Manager) were also a big part of the success issue #58 of RGR. Israel worked hard on the design and also arranged sort of a media tour in Mexico to spread the word. Thanks to that, we were invited to the Fiesta de Los Libros and the Feria del Libro de la Frontera; both events helped us get in touch with the community in Juárez that was not that aware of RGR existence despite being a journal that wants, as mentioned before, to connect with writers from the border. As for German, thanks to him, we could create alliances with la Escuela de Escritores de Madrid or even have authors such as Liliana Collanzi featured in the journal. Dr. Rosa Alcalá (chair of the Creative Writing Department at UTEP) and Dr. Andrea Cote Botero (Faculty advisor) were also a great support in the process.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rgrjournal/
• Facebook: https://twitter.com/rgrutep
• Twitter: https://www.facebook.com/RioGReview/
• Other: https://linktr.ee/riograndereview