Instructor Spotlight: Leticia Priebe Rocha
What inspired you to teach this course?
The most honest answer to this question is that loneliness has been a formative experience in my life. In my loneliest periods, creative writing has been the beacon I found to voice that struggle and send a light out for connection. Beyond my creative writing practice, my academic background is in Clinical Psychology. I have worked extensively with vulnerable populations like immigrants and the elderly, and it always strikes me how loneliness and mental health are deeply intertwined. Through these interdisciplinary experiences, I became obsessed with understanding how loneliness is portrayed across different forms of media that we consume and how other creatives communicate their own experiences of loneliness. This course is a loving encapsulation of that obsession—I have cherished cultivating a communal learning experience where students can engage with something as vulnerable as loneliness and feel empowered by their own sincerity.
What is the importance of studying and writing about loneliness right now?
Being a person has always been a contradictory experience punctuated by the inevitability of our own demise. With this in mind, it becomes clear that loneliness has been a facet of humanity from the origin of our species. However, it is undeniable that many factors in the last decade have fragmented our sense of interconnectedness, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, profound reliance on technology, and rising fascism. We are living in an era where we are constantly sold every possible shortcut to comfort and complacency, creating an illusion that original thought and connection to one’s own humanity is scarce. More than ever, it is crucial that we find and articulate what is shared between us, including our experiences of loneliness. In order to both assuage loneliness and resist increasing censorship, we must lean into culture and artistic creation to forge community and collective empowerment.
What would you recommend to Tufts students who might be feeling lonely?
College can be an incredibly lonely period of someone’s life, despite the numerous social events in place to facilitate connection. There is a lot of pressure around “finding your people” in college, and while this may happen for some, lasting connections are far more rare than we would like to think. Even when we do find meaningful relationships, the sheer absurdity of the world we live in can render us lonely. Understanding that loneliness is an inevitable part of being human is uncomfortable, but it is also the key to feeling less lonely. Seeking connection is always going to be vulnerable and scary, yet you are not alone in your loneliness. In my experience, the only way out of loneliness is through community, and the only way to find community is to keep showing up. If one space is not the right fit for you, keep looking. Look for ways to do what sparks life within you, whether that’s a creative practice, movement, organizing, or any of the infinite combinations of possibilities we carve.
Leticia Priebe Rocha is the author of In Lieu of Heartbreak, This is Like (Bottlecap Press, 2024). Her work has been published in Salamander, Rattle, and elsewhere. She was the recipient of 2020 Academy of American Poets University & College Poetry Prize, is a 2025 Undocupoets Fellow, and has been supported by the Fine Arts Work Center. Leticia is also a UX Researcher at Toyota Research Institute. She graduated from Tufts in 2020.