Dr. González-Rivera grew up in Matagalpa, Nicaragua. She obtained her Ph.D. in Latin American history from Indiana University, her M.A. in Latin American history from the University of New Mexico, and her B.A. from Oberlin College. She is the author of two historical monographs, Five Hundred Years of LGBTQIA+ History in Western Nicaragua (University of Arizona Press, 2024) and Before the Revolution: Women’s Rights and Right-Wing Politics in Nicaragua, 1821-1979 (Penn State University Press, 2011). She is also the author of  "Why My Nicaraguan Father Did Not 'See' His Blackness And How Latinx Anti-Black Racism Feeds On Racial Silence" and the book chapter "The History of Women’s Suffrage in Nicaragua: An Incomplete Story" in the 2024 book Women's Suffrage in the Americas. 

Her research has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS). Dr. González-Rivera was recently promoted to Professor in the Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies at San Diego State University, where she has taught for 20 years.