His research and teaching focus on Chicana/o and Latina/o literature, African American literature, U.S. ethnic and radical protest literatures, Marxist theory and political economy, and critical theories of race. López’s articles have appeared in MELUS: The Journal of the Society for the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States, College Literature: A Journal of Critical Literary Studies, and Science & Society: A Journal of Marxist Thought and Analysis.