Teddy Cruz is a professor of public culture and urbanization in the Department of Visual Arts at the University of California, San Diego. He is known internationally for his urban research on the Tijuana/San Diego border, and more broadly for advancing border neighborhoods as sites of cultural production from which to rethink urban policy, affordable housing, and public space. He was a recipient of the Rome Prize in Architecture in 1991; other honors include representing the United States in the 2008 Venice Biennale of Architecture, a 2011 Ford Foundation Visionaries Award, and the 2013 Architecture Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.