FALL 2025

This course surveys the history of Latin America from 1450 to the early 1800s. It examines the historical processes and the impact that Spanish and Portuguese colonial rule had on Indigenous, Black, and Asian populations.

WINTER 2027

The course examines the main ideas and political debates regarding gender equality and sexual freedom in modern Latin America. Students will study key academic works about the political and social movements at the center of those historical debates. This includes differences between women’s equality and women’s liberation movements, and how and why social interpretations of feminism shifted in the 20th century.

WINTER 2026

The course will explore the histories of thirty-three countries both as case studies and in a broader context. The class materials will focus on critical and seminal events that characterized Latin America since independence from Spain.

WINTER 2026

Historical memory studies emerged in the 20th century as a method to understand collective identities and experiences, and, later, as an avenue to articulate collective and historical trauma. This class will examine the complex role of historical memory in Latin America through the concepts of collective, official, counter, and living memory, as well as memory battles and historical trauma.

WINTER 2024

Latin American society is a diverse population characterized by a variety and combinations of racial, ethnic, gender, sexual, religious, regional, and national identities. Introduction to Latin American Cultures examines a breadth of cultural expressions and lived experiences that make up Latin American and Caribbean societies. This course will present a historical and broad overview of Latin American societies focusing on the 19th and 20th centuries.

FALL 2025

How do we uncover the past in an era of digital information overload? This course equips students with the digital tools and critical frameworks needed to navigate and analyze digital data from a historical perspective. From web archiving and text mining to algorithmic critiques, students will learn how to locate and interpret internet sources while considering Big Data's ethical and methodological challenges. Explore how social media shapes historical memory, analyze the cultural impact of memes, and build interactive digital projects that bring the past to life. By the end of the course, students will not only be skilled digital historians but also critical thinkers ready to tackle the complexities of history in the digital age.

SPRING 2026

This course examines how soccer—fútbol—reflects and shapes the social, political, and cultural life of Latin America. We will explore its emergence in South America, the role of membership-run clubs, and the ways class, gender, and politics intersect on and off the field. As the world looks ahead to the 2026 FIFA World Cup, we will read Eduardo Galeano’s Soccer in Sun and Shadow, a poetic exploration of the game’s beauty and contradictions. As Galeano wrote, “When good soccer happens, I give thanks for the miracle, as if seeing a rainbow after a storm.”

WINTER 2025

This seminar will examine the ways in which nation-states constructed Indianness or indigeneity in the 19th century and early 20th through the institution of the modern school. The course takes a comparative approach to identify policy patterns and shared perspectives between nations, placing the consolidation of the nation state alongside the globalization of colonial ideology. Case studies include North America, Latin America, Australia, Sweden, and Japan. (syllabus coming)