PROGRAM 27 BIO

Ann Aurelia Lopez grew up in San Bernardino California, with a father from Mexico and a mother from the deep South in the United States.   According to California law her parents’ marriage could have been considered illegal, and Ann suffered all the struggles of a child of an interracial marriage in the United States.   She became a scientist, a biologist and a Ph.d in Agro-ecology.    Ann chose to do research in Mexico and the United States, following the lives of migrant and mostly undocumented farm workers.   She chronicled their lives in her book The Farmworkers’ Journey.   Ann founded the Center For Farm Worker Families in Watsonville California, in the heart of the food belt for the United States.  She is an activist for farm worker rights, and for humane immigration policy in the US and in Mexico.