Dr. Andrea Fanta, associate professor of Spanish in the Department of Modern Languages in the Steven J. Green School of International & Public Affairs at Florida International University, has received a Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award that will take her to the Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá, Colombia during the upcoming 2023-24 academic school year.
Dr. Fanta wlll be teaching in the M.A in Cultural Studies program at the university, offering a course titled "Digital Memories of the Latin American Diaspora.” In addition to teaching, she will be developing her ongoing research project, " The Latin American Diaspora Archive , by recording and preserving the Colombian migration experience. The project, which she founded and directs, aims to establish an audio-visual memory for Latin American diasporic groups, preserve first-person stories, and articulate a digital heritage on the historical reconstruction of Latin American realities of displacement and violence.
“I am confident that this experience will enable me to develop new skills, gain fresh insights, and broaden my perspective, which will ultimately benefit both my personal and professional growth,” Dr. Fanta said.
She added, “This project could not have been developed without my department's support and openness toward the development of new curricula and new forms of understanding and researching the humanities.
“My involvement with the Wolfsonian Public Humanities Lab has been a game changer in considering what constitutes cultural production and how to engage diverse audiences in reflecting on the heritage and traditions of the human experience. The Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center (LACC) has consistently supported and invested in my ideas, providing both financial resources and guidance. LAAC's HAS (Humanities and Area Studies Faculty Research Development) Program, which I attended last summer, was instrumental in the development of my proposal. Last but not least, I owe all my reflections to the students at FIU, who have shown me new ways of thinking about what it means to be Latin American in the United States.”