Crossing Fronteras

Joe Aguilar and John Galante on the making of Crossing Fronteras

This podcast series surveys the unique ecosystem of contemporary scholarship and art being generated by scholars and creatives in New England who are working in Latin American and Caribbean Studies. Episodes in the series address topics such as knowledge production and technological adaptation in the Global South; trans activism and feminism in transnational perspective; indigenous perspectives on the cosmos and the capitalist state; and processes of cultural hybridization though migration and South-South relations. Join us for a fascinating set of conversations from thinkers and innovators crossing boundaries and expanding the frontiers of Latin American and Caribbean Studies. To learn more about the Crossing Fronteras podcast, visit https://wp.wpi.edu/lacs/podc/ To learn more about the Latin American and Caribbean Studies program at WPI, visit https://www.wpi.edu/academics/departments/humanities-arts/latin-american-caribbean-studies

Eden Medina on the role of science and technology in Chile's political history

Eden Medina (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), an historian of science and technology, addresses relationships between technology and politics in her work on Project Cybersyn, a radical computational experiment by the 1970s government of Salvador Allende, and her upcoming project on the use of forensics in the search for truth and reconciliation. She also reflects on approaches to AI in teaching and learning at a STEM university. To learn more about the Crossing Fronteras podcast, visit https://wp.wpi.edu/lacs/podc/ To learn more about the Latin American and Caribbean Studies program at WPI, visit https://www.wpi.edu/academics/departments/humanities-arts/latin-american-caribbean-studies

Javier Puente on Peru's central highlands, identity politics, and dynamite

Javier Puente (Smith College) discusses historical relations between indigenous communities and the state during Peru's internal armed conflict, theories of underdevelopment, and future projects on dynamite and El Niño. He also considers the pitfalls of identity-based epistemologies in academic research and the dangerous appeal of authoritarianism in the Americas. To learn more about the Crossing Fronteras podcast, visit https://wp.wpi.edu/lacs/podc/ To learn more about the Latin American and Caribbean Studies program at WPI, visit https://www.wpi.edu/academics/departments/humanities-arts/latin-american-caribbean-studies

Macarena Gómez-Barris on extractivism's threats to humans and the more-than-human

Macarena Gómez-Barris (Brown University), an interdisciplinary scholar, speaks on decolonial advocacy and creative expression in indigenous activism, and alliances formed among peoples and between human and more-than-human subjects in opposing extractive capitalism. She also discusses how greater attention given to perspectives from the Global South might further reshape considerations of knowledge production, learning, community, and activism in higher education. To learn more about the Crossing Fronteras podcast, visit https://wp.wpi.edu/lacs/podc/ To learn more about the Latin American and Caribbean Studies program at WPI, visit https://www.wpi.edu/academics/departments/humanities-arts/latin-american-caribbean-studies

Aarti Smith Madan on Argentinian intellectuals and Afro-Brazilian street art

Aarti Smith Madan (Worcester Polytechnic Institute), a scholar of Latin American literature and spatial humanities, maps the trajectory of her interests in nineteenth-century Argentine nation-builders, gauchos as literary subjects, and histories of South-South interactions through connections between Argentina and India. She also outlines her research on the manifestations of Afro-Brazilian consciousness in street art, artistic identity, and social media. To learn more about the Crossing Fronteras podcast, visit https://wp.wpi.edu/lacs/podc/ To learn more about the Latin American and Caribbean Studies program at WPI, visit https://www.wpi.edu/academics/departments/humanities-arts/latin-american-caribbean-studies