Alana Holt
Alana studied photojournalism and English at the University of North Texas and is now pursuing a degree in family studies (pre-occupational therapy) at Texas Woman’s University. She has a passion for writing and photography and quickly developed a hunger for travel. She has travelled across the U.S., chasing the Milky Way and a solar eclipse, discovering beautiful landscapes in the hopes of capturing an image that tells a story and expresses the marvel of adventure. She lived and studied in Australia for five months and, less than a year later, she joined fellow journalists for the Heart of Mexico, where she worked as a writer and photographer. These experiences fueled her passions, driving her to pursue photography and the rich stories and culture of those she encounters in her travels. In her stories, Alana seeks to break stereotypes and within the incredible tales of bravery and sacrifice that the Heart of Mexico trip introduced her to.
Angélica Moreno
Angélica Moreno studies English language at the Autonomous University of the State of Mexico. She participated as an interpreter in the 2016 Heart of Mexico project. She has been interested in languages since an early age. One of her greatest ambitions is to discover new areas where language students may develop themselves beyond translation and teaching. Her long-term objective is to learn more languages besides English and French.
Brittany Sodic
Brittany Sodic is a 2017 graduate of the Mayborn School of Journalism at the University of North Texas. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in print and digital journalism. She has written for publications such as Denton Live Magazine, Study Breaks Magazine and The Killeen Daily Herald. Her photography has been published in Denton Live Magazine, The NT Daily and The Killeen Daily Herald. Brittany also wrote the feature cover story for the September issue of Study Breaks Magazine. She currently works as an editorial assistant for The Killeen Daily Herald in Killeen, Texas. During her time in Mexico, she could be seen feeding every street dog she came across. She spent many pesos on bags of dog food, but wished she could do more.
Daniel Hernández
Daniel Hernández holds a B.A. in communication studies from the Autonomous University of the State of Mexico. He is interested in music, literature and film, but his real passion is photography. Daniel considers photography more than just capturing an image; it is a method of relaxation and personal development, as it allows him to go places and meet people. It also allows him to experience new sensations, learn something new every day, and share his vision of the world. His participation in the 2016 Heart of Mexico project represented a significant change for Daniel, as it challenged him to focus on photojournalism. He believes that, through photography, he is able to communicate extraordinary stories – especially those of marginalized people who, most of the time, are forgotten but who have powerful stories.
Erica Wieting
Erica Wieting holds a bachelor’s degree in photojournalism from the University of North Texas and has a background in graphic design. She participated in the 2016 Heart of Mexico program as a photographer and spent her time not only learning about the Mexican culture and heritage but also growing close to the local families she worked with. She hopes the images she and her team captured will positively influence perceptions of Mexico. Erica is currently following her artistic passions as a graphic designer in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She hopes to travel the globe exploring social issues and advocating for change.
Greta Díaz
Greta Díaz holds a bachelor’s degree in communications from the Autonomous University of the State of Mexico. Greta participated in the 2014 Heart of Mexico project as a photographer and co-translator of “More than a Midwife” and “Catching the Wind.” In 2015, she returned to the Heart of Mexico project and worked as a videographer, writer and assistant. Greta attended the 2016 program as an assistant and was fascinated to see how the project had progressed. The Heart of Mexico project changed Greta’s vision of Mexico; it also made her want to pursue journalism in order to influence the future of her country. Currently she is working as a journalist for a public radio station in her hometown in the state of Mexico. Greta works on stories about gender equality, migration and social issues. In 2017 she was awarded with the COMECYT Scientific and Technological Innovation Journalism Award. Greta works in radio as well as video and photography. She went back to school in 2018 and is specializing in gender violence and public policy. Greta believes that Mexico deserves better journalism, one without censorship. She also believes that journalism shows you the beauty in humanity and in the world. Greta hopes to keep growing as a journalist and to never stop using photography as a way of expressing herself.
Cecilia Ballí
Cecilia Ballí is an independent journalist, writer and cultural anthropologist. Her essays and reporting along the U.S.-Mexico border have appeared in Texas Monthly, where she is a writer-at-large, and in Harper’s magazine, as well as various anthologies, including Best American Crime Writing. She has also written for The New York Times and San Antonio Express-News. She has been a finalist for the Livingston Awards, the John Bartlow Martin Award for Public Interest Magazine Journalism, and the J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress Award. A member of the Ochberg Society for Trauma Journalism, Ballí has held writing residencies at the Lanesboro Arts Center, the Headlands Center for the Arts, and the Lannan Foundation. She was a 2014-2015 Jesse H. Jones Dobie Paisano Fellow with the Texas Institute of Letters and a 2016 fellow with The Nation Institute. She was a professor for six years in the anthropology department at the University of Texas at Austin, where she taught in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands Program. Ballí is a graduate of Stanford and Rice universities. A Brownsville, Texas, native, she lives in Houston.
Estela Guzmán Ayala
Estela Guzmán Ayala is a sociologist from the National Autonomous University of Mexico. She has worked with migrants for more than 25 years. In Oaxaca she founded the state office of the National Program for Agricultural Workers, in which for eight years she provided support to families of migrants working in northwestern Mexico and in California. In Chicago, as a consul, she founded the Representation of the Paisano Program—an office responsible for attending the rights and obligations of the Mexican community abroad. After returning to Mexico, Ayala founded, in the state of Yucatan, the first office dedicated to Migrants’ Attention and International Affairs. She is currently an independent consultant focused on the research and promotion of the rights of migrants and their families. For most of her professional life, migration and migrants have been the focus of both her work and heart. She participated in Heart of Mexico 2016 as a Logistics Coordinator and a Research Consultant.
Lenin Martell
Lenin Martell, Project Director, teaches full time at the School of Political and Social Sciences in the University of the State of Mexico where he is also the coordinator at the Writing Center. He believes the Heart of Mexico project has innovated the teaching of narrative journalism. He holds a Ph.D. in Political and Social Sciences from the National University of Mexico and graduated in Mass Communication studies from Boston University. He has co-authored several academic books and essays on media and cultural studies. Prior to that, he worked as a bilingual education editor for several publishers in the United States. Lenin currently writes for the Zócalo media magazine. He appears regularly as a media and public affairs commentator at a variety public radio stations. He currently serves as an ombudsman at Radio Educación public radio station. Lenin lives in Mexico City and races in open-water swimming marathons.
Madiha Kark
Madiha Kark is a narrative journalist with an M.A. in Journalism from UNT. She works as a communications and photography specialist at McLennan Community College in Waco, Texas. Kark served as the writing coach for the Heart of Mexico Project in 2016. She was born and grew up in Lahore, Pakistan, and started her journalism career there. Kark’s work has been published online in publications including Narratively and Warscapes.
Morty Ortega
Morty Ortega is a visual journalist with a master’s in Journalism from UNT who has won awards for his coverage of stories ranging from immigration to environmental issues. He works as a Multimedia Specialist, producing videos and photos for Baylor University in Waco, Texas. He’s also a staff member of Foundry Photojournalism Workshops, a grassroots organization that strives to bring photojournalism education to all corners of the developing world. Ortega has lived and traveled in his native Chile and Mexico and covered stories from Guatemala to Myanmar. He worked on the inaugural Heart of Mexico project in 2013. He returned in 2015 and 2016, serving as web designer, visuals and content editor, and translator.
Thorne Anderson
Thorne Anderson is Associate Professor for photojournalism and multimedia storytelling in the Mayborn School of Journalism at the University of North Texas. He is founder and co-director with Lenin Martell of the Heart of Mexico immersion journalism program for narrative storytellers in multimedia documentary, for which they received the NAFSA Paul Simon Spotlight Award for innovation in international education. Anderson maintains a professional journalism practice and was awarded the RTDNA Edward R. Murrow national award for excellence in video in 2017. In September 2018 he will assume an appointment as Endowed Chair for Narrative and Multimedia Journalism at the University of North Texas. Professor Anderson believes it is important for journalists to challenge themselves and their audiences, to immerse themselves in the lives of their subjects, to see beyond the obvious, to extract the extraordinary from the mundane, and to reveal the sacred in the profane. He speaks Spanish like he dances – badly but without shame.
