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Throughout the 2021–22 academic year, Texas A&M International University will host a seven-part lecture series titled "Diverse Cultures, Diverse Humanities." The first three events, all sharing a thematic focus on issues related to diversity in the humanities, will be held during the fall 2021 semester. Each lecture will take place via Zoom and is free and open to the public.
The inaugural presentation took place on September 16, 2021, featuring Silvio Torres-Saillant, professor of English and Dean's Professor of the Humanities at Syracuse University. His lecture, titled "Racist Violence as Civilization in the Americas Since 1492," is available to view online.
The next two programs will feature author ire'ne lara silva presenting "Art and Transformation: The Stories That Shape Us" (September 30) and historians Irma Cantú and Abigail Meert presenting "Women in the Developing World" (October 14). Continue below for additional details.
Art and Transformation: The Stories That Shape Us
A lecture by ire'ne lara silva
Thursday, September 30, 2021, 7:00 p.m. CT
Register here.
ire'ne lara silva is the author of four poetry collections, furia, Blood Sugar Canto, CUICACALLI/House of Song, and FirstPoems; two chapbooks, Enduring Azucares and Hibiscus Tacos; and a short story collection, flesh to bone, which won the Premio Aztlán. She and poet Dan Vera are also the coeditors of Imaniman: Poets Writing in the Anzaldúan Borderlands, a collection of poetry and essays. She is the recipient of a 2021 Tasajillo Writers Grant, a 2017 NALAC Fund for the Arts Grant, and the final Alfredo Cisneros del Moral Award and was the Fiction Finalist for AROHO's 2013 Gift of Freedom Award. Most recently, she was awarded the 2021 Texas Institute of Letters Shrake Award for Best Short Nonfiction. She is currently working on her first novel, Naci, and a second collection of short stories titled the light of your body. Her lecture will explore identity and upbringing in relation to writing and storytelling.
Women in the Developing World
A lecture by Irma Cantú and Abigail Meert
Thursday, October 14, 2021, 7:00 p.m. CT
Register here.
Irma Cantú is associate professor of Mexican and colonial literature at Texas A&M International University. She has published numerous articles and essays on travel writing and Orientalism in journals in the United States, Mexico, and Europe. She has contributed to several volumes of literary and cultural criticism, such as Materias dispuestas: Juan Villoro ante la crítica, edited by José Ramón Ruisánchez and Oswaldo Zavala; Colonial Itineraries of Contemporary Mexico, edited by Oswaldo Estrada and Anna M. Nogar; and Los oficios del nómada. Fabio Morábito ante la crítica, edited by Sarah Pollack and Tamara Williams.
Abigail Meert is assistant professor of history at Texas A&M International University. Her research focuses on the study of conflict and society in East Africa, looking specifically at how East African political leaders have constructed and asserted their legitimacy since independence. She received her PhD in history from Emory University in 2019. Her research has been supported by numerous grants and fellowships, including a TAMIU University Travel Grant, a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad award, and multiple Foreign Language and Area Studies summer fellowships.
This lecture series was made possible in part by a grant from Humanities Texas.