Romance Languages and Literatures

Esteban Crespo’s research and teaching focus on 15th-, 16th-, and 17th-century Iberian cultures and literatures. His research explores gender, desire, race, and sexuality in relation to the history of the book, contemporary critical thought, and colonial studies. His current book project, Queer Pleasures: Constructing Early Modern Dissident Sexual Cultures, analyzes the presence of sexual and gender variance in the Iberian Peninsula and the viceroyalties of Mexico and Peru in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This project argues, on the one hand, that early modern Iberian cultures incorporated dissident sexualities and gender variance in richer, more quotidian ways than only through policing systems, including mainstream culture. On the other, it demonstrates that such ways were ubiquitous and coterminous on both sides of the Atlantic. Before joining Boston College, Dr. Crespo has taught at Boston University and has held fellowships at Harvard University (Houghton Library), Brown University (John Carter Brown Library) and the Folger Memorial Library.

“Diferencias,” in Marjorie Rubright and Stephen Spiess (eds.), Logomotives: Words that Changed the Premodern World, 129–145, Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh, 2025.

“Ambiguous Race in Early Modern Quito Sculpture,” in Nicholas R. Jones, Christina H. Lee, and Dominique Polanco (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Race in Early Modern Artistic, Material, and Visual Production, 314–327, Routledge, 2025.

“Carpentier, bíblico y dantesco: La Malinche y Rajab en La aprendiz de bruja,” Nueva Revista de Filología Hispánica, 1 (2022): 207–242.

“Psicología ascética y gimnasia comportamental: la inspiración ignaciana de William James” [with Patrizia Di Patre], Revista de Hispanismo Filosófico 24 (2019): 63–84.

“Leer el Quijote en Yale,” Cuadernos hispanoamericanos 821 (November 2018): 94–101.

 “Researching at the Folger”, Folger Virtual Salon, Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington D.C., June 27, 2025.

“A Queer Isolario: Iberian Geographies for Fugitive Genders,” organized by Rolena Adorno, Renaissance Society of America, Annual Meeting, Boston, March 20-22, 2025.

“Queer Iberian Intimacies,” Department of History, University of Rochester, February 6, 2025.

“From Diss to Book with Esteban Crespo,” with Greta Lafleur and Nicholas R. Jones, Department of Spanish and Portuguese, Yale University, February 4, 2025.

“Trans Archipielagic Utopias in Iberia,” Early Modern Trans Conference, Boston University, March 23-24, 2025.

“Trans Dis/Utopic Theory and Geography: From Las Casas to Pseudo-Quevedo,” Early Modern (Dis)continuities: Iberian Colonialisms Across the Oceans, Princeton University, October 31, 2024.

“Philocaptio sodomitica: hechicería y homosexualidad en el teatro español,” Hamilton College, April 17, 2024.

“Intimidad y redes homoeróticas transatlánticas”, Latin American Studies Association, Annual Conference, Universidad Javeriana, June 13, 2024.

“Whence?: The Trans* Atlantic Iberian Worlds,” Folger Shakespeare Memorial Library, Global Early Modern Trans Symposium, Washington D.C., May 18-21, 2023.

“Investigación por y para las diversidades LGBTIQ+” (online), Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Coordinación de Igualdad de Género, México City, May 24, 2023.

Joan Nordell Fellow, Harvard University (Houghton Library), Fall 2024 and Spring 2025

Short-Term Research Fellowship, Brown University (John Carter Brown Library), Summer 2025

Short-Term Research Fellowship, Folger Shakespeare Library, Fall 2024 and Spring 2025

Graduate and Professional School Research Fellowship, Yale University (Beinecke Library), Spring 2022

Sara Page Hill Fellowship Fund, Yale University (Graduate School of Arts and Sciences), 2018-2021.

“(Re)visiones: el poder transformador de las pasiones en el archivo americano,” English to Spanish translation of an article by in Susan Broomhall. Colonial Latin American Review, 31.2 (2022): 291-299.

Committee Member, Conference Program Committee, Renaissance Society of America, August 2023–December 2025 (by invitation of the Committee Chair).

Committee Member, Webinars Committee, Renaissance Society of America, 2021-2024 (by invitation of the Society’s President).