Kiley Guyton Acosta

Kiley Guyton Acosta is a Continuing Lecturer in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She specializes in ethnographic research on Afro-Latinx expressive culture, focusing on intersections of feminism, social justice artivism, and African diaspora identities in Cuba, Brazil, and U.S. Caribbean diaspora communities. Her teaching includes U.S. Latino Literature and Spanish language courses for heritage speakers.

Acosta holds a Ph.D. from the University of New Mexico (2013). She has developed interdisciplinary courses in Black Studies and Feminist Studies and serves as a Teaching Fellow for The AfroLatinidades Institute Advanced Mentorship and Summer Research Program, partnering UCSB with Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs).

She is an invited presenter for the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s Teacher Institutes, focusing on arts integration in K-12 education. Beyond academia, she collaborates with cultural initiatives like the Smithsonian Folklife Festival and serves as International Representative of Ojundegara, an award-winning Cuban Arará folkloric ensemble.

Her work emphasizes antiracism through collaborations with artists, musicians, and activists across the U.S. and Latin America, including projects with Cuban journalist Pedro Pérez Sarduy’s Afro-Cuban Voices.