Professor Rivera has been conducting research on 19th- and 20th-century Spanish Caribbean literature and theories related to the exploration of limits or borders (i.e., the edges or places where multiple cultures touch or come into contact). He has been exploring how Caribbean traditional modes of representation have been restructured to significant changes in cultural, literary, and historical contexts. Professor Rivera’s focus is on studying how "marginal" groups (radical Caribbean male intellectuals and women writers) view themselves within those borders and devising new representational structures for their survival or enfranchisement under challenging conditions. Among his topics of interest are: modernity and modernization, the genders of modernity, literary strategies used in the construction of a national and personal subjectivity, nationalism and literary discourses, the role of the intellectual and its relationship to literature, Spanish Caribbean literature, travel literatures, syncretic practices and literature, transvestism and strategies of representation, and consumer cultures. The authors Professor Rivera has studied include Carmela Eulate Sanjurjo (Puerto Rico), Alejandro Tapia y Rivera (Puerto Rico), Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda (Cuba), Carlos Varo (Spain-Puerto Rico), Eugenio María de Hostos (Puerto Rico), Mayra Montero (Cuba-Puerto Rico), Rosario Ferré (Puerto Rico), Marta Aponte Alsina (Puerto Rico), Salomé Ureña de Henríquez (Dominican Republic), and Mayra Santos (Puerto Rico). In addition, Professor Rivera has been interested in teaching courses related to film studies. He enjoys teaching courses related to Spain and Latin America, such as film, literature, culture and civilization, business environments, and business Spanish, as well as courses related to the learning of Spanish. Also, on several occasions he has taught courses for UMASS (graduate course), Clark University, and Boston College.