Photo of Mario Cancel-Bigay

Mario Cancel-Bigay

Clinical Assistant Professor of Liberal Studies

Mario Cancel-Bigay is Clinical Assistant Professor of Liberal Studies. He holds a B.A. in Modern Languages (Portuguese and French) from the University of Puerto Rico, an M.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies from New York University and a Ph.D. in ethnomusicology from Columbia University. He is a singer-songwriter, poet, translator and an expert of the Puerto Rican cuatro, Puerto Rico’s national guitar. His research revolves around anticolonialism, decoloniality, neoliberalism and cross-cultural encounters as heard through Puerto Rican nueva canción, chanson québécoise and related sounds of resistance from Puerto Rico and Québec during the 1960s and 1970s. Prior to joining NYU, Mario held a postdoctoral appointment at Columbia University where he taught Contemporary Civilization (a philosophy course for undergraduates), Western Art Music, and musics of Latin America, the Caribbean and West Asia. Mario’s style of teaching is characterized by the fostering of a space where students can share divergent views in a respectful way building upon one another’s insights and the ideas expressed by the authors, thus producing knowledge collectively

Education

  • Ph.D. Columbia University
  • M.A. New York University
  • B.A. University of Puerto Rico

Teaching and Research Interests

Neoliberalism, colonialism, coloniality, socially aware musics and poetry of the 1960s and 1970s, Marxism/Post-Marxism, Puerto Rico, Québec, the Caribbean, Latin America.

Selected Honors and Awards

  • 2020-2021:  Graduate Student Core Preceptor Award (Contemporary Civilization), Columbia College, Columbia University

  • 2019-2020:  Hutner Named Fellowship, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Columbia University

  • 2018-2019:  Mellon Humanities International Travel Fellowship, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Columbia University

Publications

  • “Lise Vachon and «Octobre au mois de mai »: Relistening to the Québécois Revolution” in American Music (forthcoming)

  • “Puerto Rican Nueva Canción: Challenging and Consenting to Neoliberalism in a Colonial Context” in Science and Society (forthcoming)

  • “Revisiting Puerto Rican Nueva Canción and Its Discourse of Resistance.” In Made in Puerto Rico: Studies in Popular Music, Ed. Hugo R. Viera Vargas et al., Routledge (forthcoming)

  • 2021 “¿Conoces este disco de papi con Johnny Rodríguez y su trío?: Ansonia Records and Puerto Rico.” In “Intervenxions,” The Latinx Project. https://www.latinxproject.nyu.edu/intervenxions/conoces-este-disco-de-papi- con-johnny-rodrguez-y-su-tro-ansonia-records-and-puerto-rico