Crystal Vance Guerra

Crystal Vance Guerra (she/her) is a Chicana poet, historian, and educator based in Chicago and Mexico City. Her art is Latin Americanist at root, often Spanglish in expression, and written to be read out loud.

Guerra is the founder of Chicago’s only poetry slam in Spanish, Slam Diáspora. This slam brings together Latinx poets in the United States and poets across Latin America to foster unity between poetic communities despite borders. As a slam poet, she is the 2020 winner of Mexico City’s Slam, was a participant in Mexico’s 2021 National Slam and the 2022 World Poetry Slam, and was a finalist in the Gwendolyn Brooks Award Slam (2023). Guerra was selected to participate in the Mujeres Poetas en el País de las Nubes poet residency (Mexico, 2019) and at the Atlantic Center for the Arts residency (United States, 2021).

Guerra has also been a featured artist in Poesía en Abril in Chicago (2022), Querétaro’s FILMAQ International Book and Audiovisual Media Fair (2023), and in Chicago’s Feria del Libro. Throughout her poetic journey, she continues to lead poetry workshops on both sides of the Rio Bravo, encouraging others to explore poetry in Spanish. Guerra’s art reflects her tri-cultural heritage, combining elements of her Mexican, American, and Honduran familial roots while bridging cultural and linguistic divides through the power of poetry.

Guerra has worked as a freelance journalist and researcher, with her work published in Yes! Magazine, The Guardian, Truthout, and AREA Chicago.

Guerra earned a BA in Africana studies and Latin American and Caribbean studies from Brown University and an MA in Latin American and Caribbean studies from Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México.