Martínez, Demetria 1960-

Writer. Born in Albuquerque, N.M. Educated at Princeton University where Demetria Martínez took courses in religious social ethics. Her writings contain a mix of personal and political themes, focusing heavily on the Sanctuary Movement to aid Salvadoran refugees and on interpersonal relationships.

Demetria Martínez was born in Albuquerque, NM on July 10, 1960. She graduated from Albuquerque High School in 1978 and received her B.A. from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University in 1982. While at Princeton, Martínez took courses in religious social ethics at Princeton Theological Seminary. She began writing poetry after graduating from Princeton. Martínez' writings contain a mix of personal and political themes, focusing heavily on the sanctuary movement to aid Salvadoran refugees and on interpersonal relationships. In 1987, Martínez was indicted on charges related to smuggling Central American refugees into the United States. In 1988, she was acquitted of those charges.

Martínez began working as a journalist in 1980 with a summer internship at the Albuquerque News. She was a reporter-intern for Time, Inc. in 1981. She worked as a writer for the Albuquerque Journal from the mid-1980's until the late 1980's. In the mid- 1980's, she also began working for the National Catholic Reporter. In 1989, Demetria Martínez' first collection of poetry, Turning was published. Some of her other writings have been published in various anthologies, including Three Times a Woman, After Aztlan, Latino Poets of the Nineties, Las Mujeres Hablan, Voces: An Anthology of Nuevo Mexicano Writers, and Infinite Divisions. Her first novel, MotherTongue was published in 1994 and won the 1994 Western States Book Award for Fiction. Currently, Demetria Martínez lives in Tucson, Arizona where she continues to work as a columnist for the National Catholic Reporter. She is also working on her second novel, Mexican Rubies.