Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

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Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz (born 10 September 1939 as Roxanne Dunbar) is an American professor of ethnic studies, radical leftist, feminist activist, and writer. In the 1960s and 1970s, she was active in the anti-Vietnam War and radical left movements and worked closely with the SDS, the Weather Underground, and the African National Congress. She was also very active in the women's rights movement, and from 1968–1970 was the leading figure in the radical feminist group, Cell 16.

Dunbar-Ortiz was born in San Antonio, Texas, and is of partial American Indian background. She spent most of her youth growing up in the rural community of Piedmont, Oklahoma. Dunbar-Ortiz's grandfather was an organizer for the Industrial Workers of the World, and for the Oklahoma Socialist Party during its brief era of success, between the beginning of statehood in 1907 and its repression following the Green Corn Rebellion of 1917.

In addition to many scholarly books and articles, she has published three memoirs, Red Dirt: Growing Up Okie (1997); Outlaw Woman: A Memoir of the War Years, 1960–1975 (2002); and Blood on the Border (2005), which is about what she saw during the Nicaraguan Contra war against the Sandinistas in the 1980s. Her writing has also appeared in Monthly Review and The Nation, and on the CounterPunch website.

She is presently Professor Emerita of Ethnic Studies at California State University, Hayward.

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