Yesenia is a PhD Candidate in Latin American History at Columbia University focusing on race, gender, slavery, and emancipation in Colombia and the Americas. In addition to writing as a monthly columnist for TeleSUR English, where I report on social movements, struggles, and popular culture in Latin America and the world, I am also the author of the forthcoming book "Selling Our Death Masks: Cash-for-Gold in the Age of Austerity" (Zero 2014), a radical historical ethnography of gold and cash-for-gold shops in our present time.