Latin American Studies

This course introduces the field of anthropology and applies it to the study of Latin America, specifically indigenous populations. In this context, it defines concepts related to populations: ethnicity minorities, Indians, indigenous populations, communities, and mixed race. It examines how public policies reflect indigenous populations through the methods used to count them. The course then addresses indigenous peoples' desire for recognition of their specific rights. Primary topics include key points on anthropology; the history of indigenous populations and current accounting of Indian populations in Latin America; study of a few specific groups: the Patagonian people, the Tinigua of Colombia, the Mapuche of Chile, the Yucuna of the Colombian Amazon; contemporary Indian societies; emergence of the Indian question in Latin America.

This course will explore development and underdevelopment in Latin America with a focus on contemporary resource extraction i.e. extractivism. We will analyze these problems from an anthropological perspective by focusing on local and indigenous groups experiences, and exploring the concepts, theories and alternatives coming from Latin American political and intellectual scene itself. We will begin by examining how during the second half of the XX century, "Development" became the buzzword that encompassed state intervention, urbanization projects, foreign aid and investments, and intellectual contributions such as Dependence Theory. We will focus on the changes associated with Globalization and Neoliberalism after the 1990s and the implications for Latin American local/indigenous groups. We will then examine the boom of natural resource extraction projects, and discuss case studies, debates and environmental controversies in local/indigenous territories. We will then place attention on social movements and activist networks that emerge in these contexts, and finish the course by discussing key concepts such as "post development" "post extractivism" or "Buen Vivir", proposed by Latin American thought as alternatives to "development".

This course offers an introduction to the historical and cultural processes of the Caribbean from the Lithic Age to the arrival of Christopher Columbus. Topics include: introduction to Insular Caribbean Studies; the Antillean insular environment and it's population; periodization of the pre-Hispanic Insular Caribbean; daily life and Antillean material culture; Antillean mythology and worldview; first contact with Europeans.

This course discusses some of the most representative and foundational texts of the narrative genre from the late 19th and mid-20th centuries, as well as several lesser-known authors who were marginalized within the canon during the boom in Latin American literature. Topics include: the Latin American short narrative of the late 19th and early 20th centuries; an overview of the Latin American short novel-- from the late 1920s to the 1950s; the tensions of the canon and the boom (1950s and 1960s). 

This course offers a study of the history of migration in Argentina. It examines the various historical contexts in which immigrant communities arrived in Argentina and how they were integrated into, or marginalized by, a larger national community. This course discusses how migratory phenomena affect the position and relationship of Argentina with other countries in the region and on a global scale.

This course presents the discussion of Brazilian culture in its most relevant aspects to students who come from other cultures. Rethink Brazil through the reading of possible stereotypes present in images internationally disseminated, taking into consideration the process of construction of the Brazilian Portuguese Language and the verbal, non-verbal, and social interactional patterns currently in use. This course provides effective contact with different cultural aspects such as ethnic diversity, art, religion, folklore, culinary, and language through theoretical readings, debates, and eventual lectures about specific cultural topics.