B.A., 1977, Yale; MA/MFA 1983, Boston University.

16th and 17th century Spanish and Colonial Latin American women writers; spriritual autobiography and mysticism; lyrical texts; 17th-century women's sapphic verse; Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz. Literary translation: theory and practice. Queer theory.

Books:

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz. The Answer/La Respuesta, with a Selection of Poems. Translated and edited by Electa Arenal and Amanda Powell (The Feminist Press at City University of New York [1994], second edition 2009.

María Salazar. Book for the Hour of Recreation of María de San José Salazar (1548-1605). Intro. Alison Weber, translation Amanda Powell (University of Chicago Press, "The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe" series, 2002).

María Palacios Berruecos. A Wild Country Out in the Garden: The Spiritual Journals of a Colonial Mexican Nun, study and translation by Kathleen Myers and Amanda Powell (Indiana University Press, 1999).

Untold Sisters: Hispanic Nuns in Their Own Works by E. Arenal and Stacey Schlau; translations of poetry and prose by Amanda Powell (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1989).