Chela Sandoval (born July 31, 1956), associate professor of Chicana Studies at University of California, Santa Barbara, is a noted theorist of postcolonial feminism and third world feminism.
Beginning with her 1991 pioneering essay 'U.S.
Third World Feminism: The Theory and Method of Oppositional Consciousness in the Postmodern World' Sandoval emerged as a significant voice for women of color and decolonial feminism.