You can read the award winning theses by clicking on the title of the theses
Why Spain? Motives for American Marginalized Community Involvement in the Spanish Civil War
Zake Morgan Memorial Thesis Award Presented fon an exceptional thesis that engages histories and practices of social change
Paige Anderson, Global Liberal Studies (Politics, Rights, and Development) and Spanish
Mentor: Ameya Tripathi, Tal Correm
This thesis aims to evaluate why members of marginalized communities in the United States decided to join the Loyalist cause in the Spanish Civil War. In order to do so, it uses three case studies: Salaria Kea, an African-American nurse, Evelyn Rahman Hutchins, a female ambulance driver, and Milton Wolff, a commander born to Jewish immigrant parents. Through these case studies it provides an alternate understanding of the International Brigade volunteers’ motivations by focusing on the individual life circumstances of each volunteer. Rather than simply adhering to the two main theories in current scholarship, political exile status and Communist Party membership, this thesis evaluates the complex social and political circumstances of the 1930s that impacted each case study’s community. It does so by centering their specific group affiliation’s experience with injustice and their personal struggles to argue that current scholarship’s generalized reasoning is inadequate in determining motivation. While it is true that volunteers may have been affiliated with the Communist Party or had a recent familial connection to European countries with growing right-wing movements, this thesis argues that these are not the only reasons for participation in the Spanish Civil War. Instead, we should take into account their experiences as marginalized people in America and the ways that their experiences with oppression pushed them into solidarity with the Spanish people. Though each of these individuals represent a larger marginalized group affiliation, through specific case analysis we can come to a greater understanding of why these volunteers risked their lives and their citizenship for the Loyalist cause.
El tira y afloja: las bases raciales y económicas de la xenofobia hacia los migrantes venezolanos en el Perú
Department of Spanish and Portuguese Award for Distinction in the Latin American Field
Hannamia Lauricella, Politics and Spanish
Mentors: Pamela Calla
La tesis, “El tira y afloja: las bases raciales y económicas de la xenofobia hacia los migrantes venezolanos en el Perú” examina cómo las matrices raciales del pasado del Perú y económicas de Venezuela ayudan a nuestra comprensión de las relaciones peruano-venezolanas en medio de la crisis humanitaria venezolana de 2015. En el Perú, la xenofobia hacia los migrantes ha incrementado desde el inicio de la crisis. Estos sentimientos se difunden principalmente en medios de comunicación, como Youtube; y además se han realizado encuestas
y estudios sobre este tema dirigidos por institutos de investigación peruanos y del extranjero. Es importante señalar que tanto Perú como Venezuela viven una crisis de gobernabilidad y orden. En Perú, la inestabilidad comenzó en 2016 con la llegada de Pedro Pablo Kucynski a la presidencia, y, más adelante, las acusaciones de corrupción llevaron a su destitución y a la subida de su vicepresidente, Martín Vizcarra. Con el cambio en la presidencia también se produjo un punto de inflexión de la gobernanza y la respuesta a la migración venezolana en forma de xenofobia institucionalizada. En Venezuela, por otro lado, la inestabilidad se maximizó a través de las dictaduras de Hugo Chávez y Nicolás Maduro y su manejo del petroestado, basado en la idea histórica de “el estado mágico”. La crisis de Venezuela existía de una forma u otra antes del siglo XXI; estos presidentes eran un síntoma más de la crisis del petroestado que estaba derrotando al país económica y socialmente.
Partiendo de la idea de que las instituciones se construyen sobre las personas, y las personas son moldeadas por las ideologías, esta tesis argumenta que la inestabilidad política y racial tiene su base en las matrices raciales e históricas de Perú, desde la época colonial, pasando por la reforma agraria de 1969 y de Sendero Luminoso en 1970, que dieron forma a ideas de blancura y anti-negritud; y también las creencias venezolanas del “estado mágico” con la abundancia infinita del petróleo y la generación de la riqueza. Estas bases han servido de matriz donde se aferra la xenofobia actual. Mi tesis incorpora datos primarios, estadísticas y análisis socioculturales para arrojar luz sobre el trasfondo político-racial de las relaciones peruano-venezolanas. Una reacción popular entre los peruanos hacia la inmigración venezolana ha sido la invención del término xenófobo “veneco” que tiene una conatación negativa, con el sentido de “ intellectually inferior, overly sexual, and animalistic”, pero además se relaciona con palabras como “ape”, “dog-eater” (Aguirre Zapata y Domahidi), que influyen en la retórica de la sociedad hacia los migrantes. La respuesta del Estado peruano bajo el presidente Martín Vizcarra, a la migración venezolana, promovió un sentimiento negativo hacia los venezolanos, tanto en las políticas públicas que intentan limitar la entrada de los venezolanos, como en la desprotección de los migrantes venezolanos en el Perú.
Esta discusión es urgente, ya que la actual crisis humanitaria venezolana lleva casi diez años en proceso. La xenofobia y las tensiones continuarán escalando y los venezolanos seguirán siendo víctimas del aislamiento a menos que el Perú reconozca sus normas y su ideología eurocéntrica, racialmente motivada. Muchos estudios sobre migración que se publican en la academia estadounidense se concentran en gran medida en la migración Sur-Norte y el impacto de esta migración en los Estados Unidos. Sin embargo, rara vez encontramos una investigación o cobertura mediática sobre la migración Sur-Sur como el caso de los venezolanos que migran al Perú, o peruanos que se van a la Argentina, entre muchos otros movimientos migratorios entre los países de América Latina.
Sodade Dessa Minha Terra: Cape Verdean Diaspora in New England
Department of Spanish and Portuguese Award for Distinction in the Luso-Afro-Brazilian Field
Sophia Moore, Romance Languages and Literature
Mentor: Jens Andermann
Cape Verde is a small archipelago off the coast of West Africa, formerly a Portuguese colony. Today, about two thirds of Cape Verdeans and their descendants live in the diaspora, with a significant community in New England. This thesis examines concepts of Lusophone diaspora and indigeneity through several case studies spanning from the 1700s to the present. In the 18th and 19th centuries, shared seafaring between the Portuguese Empire and the United States led to mass migration of Cape Verdean whaling workers to cities like New Bedford, Massachusetts. By the 1950s, Cape Verdean-Americans’ struggle to assert a mixed-race identity in the U.S. racial binary led to marginalization and forced assimilation. In 1975, Cape Verde gained independence from Portugal after over 500 years of colonization. Today, the diaspora is critical to the islands economically and politically as a source of investment, humanitarian aid, and tourism. Cape Verdeans in New England and worldwide use music and the Kriolu language to transcend borders and distance, practicing imagined community in an ever-shrinking world. Social justice continues to be paramount as Cape Verdeans in New England navigate their unique mestizu reality.
Through original research at two Cape Verdean museums in New England, as well as interviews with members of the diaspora over a two year period, I argue that the role of museums and cultural centers cannot be overstated: not only stewards of history, they bring diasporic and neighboring communities together through experiential education, fostering pride and empathy in visitors inside and outside the diaspora.
The Cape Verdean diaspora’s continually strong connection to the homeland persists after hundreds of years of migration. “Sodade dessa minha terra,” a representative song lyric popularized by legendary Cape Verdean singer Cesária Évora, means “longing for this land of mine.” This desire to return, to share in culture, unites the diaspora globally.
Aesthetic Representations: The Case of Colombia’s False Positives
Sylvia Molloy Memorial Award for Outstanding Thesis
Presented for overall excellence and originality in an Honors Thesis
Zaskia Torres, Spanish and Politics
Mentor: Lourdes Dávila
For nearly 60 years, Colombian citizens have been at the center of a violent conflict between the Marxist guerilla group, Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), referred to as the FARC, and the Colombian military. At the beginning of the 21st century, several disappearances of young men began to draw the attention of the public after the first denunciations accused the Colombian army of committing crimes against humanity. What first appeared to be an isolated tragedy was later revealed to be a systemic practice of killing civilians to present them as FARC guerilla fighters. Today, we recognize the 6,402 Colombian men and women as the “false positives”––innocent civilians murdered to be falsely recorded as a “positive” enemy combatant death. How do we begin to comprehend the magnitude of such an atrocity, let alone the grief that accompanies losing a child in this way? My thesis discusses how political-aesthetic representations of the false positives allow us to better understand its significance in Colombia. By leveraging photographic theory and engaging in an image-based analysis of Colombian filmmaker Federico Atehortúa Arteaga’s Pirotecnia (Mute Fire, 2019) and the photobook Madres Terra (2022) by photographer Carlos Saavedra and anthropologist Sebastián Ramírez, I demonstrate how the artistic premise of two diametrically different aesthetic projects are effective ways to approximate the false positives. Indeed, the timing of the formation of both projects taking place in recent years demonstrates how the process of mourning and comprehending the false positives are still at large in the country and still to be shaped by critical, discerning participants of the political process.
