Rafael C. Castillo is an American writer, who was the first editor of ViAztlan: an international journal of Arts and Letters established in San Antonio, Texas, in 1979.
A veteran freelance writer, Castillo authored articles germane to the Mexican-American community and established philosophy-based issues and supported international causes that promoted Mexican American arts and letters.
In 1985, Castillo visited Paris, France, and met briefly with David Appelfield, editor of FRANK, an international literary journal, and became its San Antonio correspondent.
In 2001, Castillo was asked to serve on the editorial board of Puentes, an international bilingual journal based at Texas A&M University–Corpus Christi.
He is included in Don Graham's Lone Star Literature (2003), an anthology of prominent Texas writers whose works have been canonized within the literary pantheon of W.W. Norton.
and Capella University in Minnesota (PhD), Castillo was one of the early free-lance writers whose contributions opened the door for Hispanics in mainstream journalism.
Catalogued as SRH-1.109 by Gilda Baeza-Ortego, Mexican American Studies Librarian, the papers are used by visiting researchers, biographers, and scholars.