Interview with Tomás Ybarra-Frausto, conducted by Sean Cook for the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics (www.hemisphericinstitute.org). Formally the Associate Director for Creativity and Culture at the Rockefeller Foundation, Tomás Ybarra-Frausto's work with the division included the Humanities Residency Fellowship Program, Museum Program, US-Mexico Fund for Culture, and La Red Latino Americana de Productores Culturales. Prior to his work at the Foundation, Tomás was a tenured professor at Stanford University in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese. As a leading historian and theorist in the field of Chicano Studies, he has written extensively on the subject and has been instrumental in defining the canons of Chicano art. Tomás has served as chair of the Board of the Mexican Museum in San Francisco and chair of the Smithsonian Council. In 1999, he was awarded the Henry Medal by the Smithsonian Institution. He received a Ph.D. in Spanish in 1979 and an M.A. in Latin American literature in 1973, both at the University of Washington at Seattle. He obtained his B.A. in Spanish from the University of Texas at Austin in 1960.