Gloria Totoricaguena, 2025 Manuel Lekuona Prize for her research and dissemination of the Basque diaspora

The researcher Gloria Totoricaguena Egurrola (Boise, Idaho, United States, 1961) has been awarded the 2025 Manuel Lekuona Prize for Basque Studies, which annually rewards people distinguished for their contribution to the Basque culture . The jury has highlighted the "pioneering" role of the researcher in the cultural, historical, political and diplomatic aspects of the Basque diaspora, as well as its contribution to the international knowledge of Basque reality.

Daughter of a family from Gernika who emigrated to the United States after the 1937 bombing, Totoricagüena studied Political Science and Education at the University of Boise and obtained another master's degree in Latin American Politics from the University of Montevideo. In 2000 she graduated from the London School of Economics with a thesis on Basque identity in the communities of America, Europe and Oceania.

Hehas been director of the Centre for Basque Studies at the University of Nevada (Reno), where he taught and lectured with the universities of Stanford and Boise. His research covers more than ten countries (Australia, Argentina, Chile and the Philippines, among others) and has created the most complete scientific database on the Basque diaspora , both in volume and quality.

Totoricaguena is the author of an extensive bibliography containing more than 800 pages on the Vasco-American experience and hundreds of photographs on the lives and experiences of emigrated families. The jury also wanted to reward the mediation work between institutions and companies in the Basque Country and America, as it did in the Think Tank Thought Initiative of the Government of Lehendakari Ibarretxe.

He currently lives between Boise and Bilbao and has two consultants specializing in multicultural research and international relations of a cultural and commercial nature.

Since 2014, the Manuel Lekuona Prize has been decided by an open vote of the Basque Global Community  , validated by an institutional jury composed of representatives of cultural entities such as Eusko Ikaskuntza, the Basque Etxepare Institute, the Barandiaran Foundation or the Royal Bascongada Society.

The award (a bronze sculpture by Remigio Mendiburu) will be presented at a public event scheduled for spring 2026.

Among the winners of the Manuel Lekuona Prize are Juan Mari Beltrán, Iñaki Martínez de Luna, Enkarni Genua, Xabier Amuriza, Mari-Jose Azurmendi or Jorge Oteiza , among others.