2020-2021 Faculty Recognition
Congratulations to our amazing faculty on their awards, publications, and accomplishments this past year. The teaching and research of LAS - affiliated faculty covers all of Latin America and spans academic disciplines across the University. These are just a few examples of the work that they do.
Talía Dajes, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, World Languages and Cultures
Professor Talía Dajes received the Ramona W. Cannon Award for Teaching Excellence in the Humanities awarded by the University's College of Humanities. Professor Dajes was also awarded the Best Essay Award from the Latin American Studies Association's (LASA) Film Studies Section for her essay, “Crímenes íntimos: incesto y violencia política en el cine peruano contemporáneo" (published in the Spring 2020 issue of A Contracorriente: una revista de estudios latinoamericanos). The award committee highlighted "the originality of the analysis, the clarity of the writing, and the significant contribution to the area of Contemporary Peruvian film" along with the article’s "innovative research". The award will be presented at the meeting of the Film Studies Section in the upcoming LASA Congress in May. LASA is the largest professional association for the study of Latin America.
Isabel Dulfano, Ph.D., Professor, World Languages and Cultures
MLA Approaches to Teaching the Works of Inca Garcilaso de la Vega to be published later 2021 will include a chapter by Isabel Dulfano on "Teaching El Inca in the Context of Indigenous Writing, Thought, and Culture."
David de Micheli, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Political Science and Ethnic Studies
Professor David de Micheli has won American Political Science of Association (APSA) 2020 Best Dissertation Prize for the Race, Ethnicity and Politics Section titled, Back to Black: Racial Reclassification, Education Reform, and Political Identity Formation in Brazil. Professor de Micheli is currently working on a book based on his dissertation.
Claudio Holzner, Ph.D., Director for the Center for Latin American Studies and Associate Professor, Political Science Department
Professor Holzner's book Voice and Inequality: Poverty and Political Participation in Latin American Democracies will be published by Oxford University Press May 13th. This book is the first large-scale study of political participation in eighteen Latin American democracies, focusing on the political participation of the region's poorest citizens.
William P. Johnson, Ph.D, Professor, Department of Geology & Geophysics
Water quality impacts from artisanal and small-scale alluvial (placer) gold mining operations occur in developing economies across several continents including Asia, Africa, and South America. They often occur in remote and/or resource-poor settings in which mitigation strategies must contend with extreme seasonal variation in river flow as well as the economic incentive to periodically churn (mine) alluvial floodplains without riparian restoration. A novel strategy addressing these constraints is herein explored which employs the alluvial floodplain for filtration-driven removal of particulate contaminants and gold from streams.
Shane Macfarlan, Ph.D, Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology
Professor Shane Macfarlan, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology received the 2020-2021 Faculty Award for Advancing Equity and Connecting Communities from the College of Social and Behavioral Science. Professor Macfarlan was also awarded tenure from the Department of Anthropology and published three articles in peer reviewed journals.
Professor Macfarlan has also been published three times this year. Cervantes PL, Darmiento N, and Thorpe C who are/were undergrads in LAS helped extract and translate data for the publications.
Macfarlan SJ, Schacht R, Schniter E, Garcia JJ, Guevara Beltran D, Lerback J. 2020. The role of dispersal and school attendance on reproductive dynamics in small, dispersed populations: Choyeros of Baja California Sur, Mexico. PLOS One 15(10):e0239523. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0239523
Schacht R, Macfarlan SJ, Meeks H, Cervantes PL, Morales F. 2020. Male survival advantage on the Baja California peninsula. Biology Letters 20200600 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2020.0660.
Macfarlan SJ, Schacht R, Bourland I, Kapp S, Glad T, Lewis L, Claflin S, Darmiento N, Clegg T, Thorpe C, Peppelar T, Nguyen B, Hall RG, Davis CS, Santiago M, Henrickson C. 2021. NDVI predicts birth seasonality in historical Baja California Sur, Mexico: Adaptive responses to arid ecosystems and the North American Monsoon. Biodemography and Social Biology 66(2). http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/19485565.2020.1870924
Susie Porter, Ph.D., Professor, Gender Studies Division/ Department of History
Susie Porter has been invited to serve as an editor for a new book series in Mexican history, “Confluencias,”at the University of Nebraska Press.
This series publishes on a wide range of topics in Mexican history including, but not limited to, the environment, Indigenous peoples, gender, technology, social history, and politics. Our authors represent diverse perspectives, and the series supports first-generation scholars and the voices and views of authors from Mexico, North America, and other parts of the world. The series is aimed at specialists and non-specialists who seek a deeper understanding of Mexico and the Mexican diaspora.