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About Us 
WELCOME FROM CHAIR
Welcome to the Latin American and Latino Studies department's Web site. I encourage you to explore this site and learn more about our distinguished faculty, undergraduate and graduate courses, graduate parenthetical notation, and related programs and events. I am proud of the faculty, staff and students who are dedicated to the innovative work we do here.
The conceptual and political work of rethinking the boundaries between area and ethnic studies began in a series of “Hemispheric Dialogues,” co-sponsored with the Chicano/Latino Research Center (CLRC), which has the mission: Cross Border Perspectives Linking the Americas. The LALS Department began in 1971-72 as Latin American Studies Program. In 1994, the name was changed to Latin American and Latino Studies, becoming one of the first such programs in the country, and in 2001, we were granted departmental status. Today we offer a major and a minor in LALS, as well as combined majors in Global Economics, Literature, Politics and Sociology. Beginning in the Fall of 2004, we began a graduate emphasis in LALS for PhD students in Anthropology, History, History of Consciousness, Literature, Psychology, Politics, Sociology and Environmental Studies.
The LALS department is a leader in the emerging field that links Latina/o Studies and Latin American Studies. Our intellectual project centers on developing the core concepts needed to understand the dynamics of cultural, social, political and economic integration in the Americas within an increasingly globalized frame of reference. This includes analyses of social inequalities on the basis of race, ethnicity, nationality, gender and/or sexuality; cultural flows that include cross-cultural communication, cultural productions or imaginaries, binational identities, collective action or social movements, as well as the social and economic dimensions of globalization, such as migration and capital flows. In our research and teaching, we aim to bridge the divide between Latina/o Studies, usually based in ethnic studies approaches, and Latin American Studies that historical was developed within area studies approaches through cross-border perspectives. And we also stress interdisciplinary perspectives that draw from the humanities, arts and social sciences. Although the LALS Department is located in the Social Science Division, our faculty are from disciplines in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences Divisions, including Anthropology, American Studies, Film and Digital Media, Politics, Literature, History, Economics, Environmental Studies, Psychology, and Sociology.
As the Chair of the Department, I encourage you to learn more about Latin American and Latino Studies by enrolling in one of our courses, becoming an LALS major or minor, or applying for the graduate emphasis (parenthetical notation) in LALS. Or come by and visit our new offices in Merrill College whenever you have time. I look forward to meeting with you and sharing my thoughts about Latin American and Latino Studies on our campus.
Saludos muy cordiales,
Pat Zavella
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