ReLACS Podcast

Merle Collins was the Director of LASC. She is a professor in the Department of English and a 2018 UMD Distinguished Scholar-Teacher. An excerpt from her 1987 novel Angel was published in Her True True Name. Also a creative writer, Collins is the author of novels, collections of poetry, short story collections, and several critical essays on Caribbean literature and Grenadian culture and politics. Recent essays include “Louise Langdon Norton Little. Grenadian Mother of Malcolm X. Caribbean Quarterly, 2020 and “Explorations of the Self.” Rafael Dalleo & Curdella Forbes, ed., Caribbean Literature in Transition, 1920-1970. Volume 2. Cambridge University Press, 2021.

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May 11, 2021

Lisa W. Carney was a Postdoctoral Associate for the Department of Dean and the Latin American Studies Center, as well as the coordinator of the Dissertation Success Program for the Graduate School Writing Center. She received her Ph.D. in May 2020 from the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Maryland, where she specialized in indigenous cultural production, contemporary Latin American literature and Quechua language narrative from the Andes and Amazon region. Her dissertation, “By the Authority of Dreams: Truth and Knowledge in Kichwa Muskuy Narratives” examined how verbal artistry and linguistic elements contribute to credibility and authoritative knowledge in Kichwa-speaking communities of the Ecuadorian tropical forest.

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October 15, 2020

Ofelia Montelongo is a bilingual writer originally from Mexico. She received a BA in accounting and finance, an MBA, and a BA in English and Creative Writing. She recently graduated with a MA in Spanish and Latin American Literature. Ofelia is a freelance writer and photographer and has collaborated with magazines such as Phoenix New Times, So Scottsdale, Phoenix Magazine, The Writer’s Guide, among others. She led creative writing workshops in Spanish at Palabras Bilingual Bookstore and was the Editor-in-Chief for the journal Superstition Review in the fall of 2016. Her research interests include Chicano and Latin American literature, theory of translation, borderlands, creative writing, and more. Her work has been published in Latino Book Review, Los Acentos Review, Rio Grande Review, Ponder Review, The Lindenwood Review, and elsewhere. Her short story “Botones” will be published in This Is What America Looks Like: The Washington Writers Publishing House Anthology in 2021. Currently, she is reading for Potomac Review and writes an interview series where she showcases Latinx Literary community members of the Washington, DC area. She is the 2019 Writer’s Center Undiscovered Voices Fellow and the PEN America New Voices Fellow for the Old Town Books Festival. Book club // ofeliamontelongo.com

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February 17, 2020

Sabrina González is a PhD candidate in the Department of History. She graduated from Universidad Nacional de La Matanza, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, with a BA in social communication. Her dissertation entitled: “Schools as Laboratories: Science, Children’s Bodies, and School Reformers in the Making of Modern Argentina (1880-1930)” studies the historical processes by which schoolteachers in South America used education as a tool for emancipation and built a transnational school reform movement that both challenged and contributed to children’s disciplining. In Argentina, she has taught multiple classes at public universities, high schools, and alternative schools for adults. Since 2006, she has been working with social movements as a communicator, educator, and student and labor organizer. At UMD, she tried to bring her previous activism to engage with the Latin American and Latinx community on campus. As an advocate for community building and collective action she co-founded the Latin American Studies Center Writing Group and the LASC Graduate Student Collective, and she served as the co-president of the History Graduate Student Association (2018-2019). After working as a GA for LASC in 2015-2019, Sabrina is excited to come back to LASC offices as a Graduate Resident and keep contributing to the center’s interdisciplinary mission and community building.

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February 6, 2020

Sergio Garcia is a Fulbright Scholar from Guatemala. He graduated from Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala with a BA in Civil Engineering. He is currently pursuing a Water Resources MSc degree at the University of Maryland, College Park, and is part of the Center for Disaster Resilience at the A. James Clark School of Engineering. His research focuses on improving the comprehension of risk to natural hazards in Guatemala. Sergio has significant experience working in municipal planning in both rural and semi-rural environments in Guatemala. He has also assisted in developing educational projects near Guatemala City's garbage dump and is currently working to design and build a new community development and educational program in the same area. Sergio has also played in several musical groups and participated in various non-profit music projects.

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December 23, 2019

Victor Hernandez-Sang is a Ph.D. student of ethnomusicology originally from the Dominican Republic. His doctoral project examines the performance of gaga (Haitian-Dominican music and dance) and explores race, immigration, and racial discrimination in the Dominican Republic. At the University of Maryland, he also worked toward his masters degree and his thesis focuses on the performance of palos music in fiestas de misterios in the Dominican Republic. In summer 2018, he started working on his doctoral project conducting field research with the support of the Graduate School Summer Research Fellowship. Before coming to UMD, he received his B.A. from Luther College, Decorah, IA in music (flute performance) and taught flute, ear training, and English in his hometown, Santiago. Victor has contributed to the LASC annual student conference since 2016 as a presenter and member of the organizing committee.

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December 15, 2019

Daniel Teodoro is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Geographical Sciences at the University of Maryland, College Park. His research characterizes scientist-stakeholder participation in the management of socio-ecological systems through a social network perspective and evaluates the role of indicators as part of these processes. His dissertation will examine this question using case studies from both a developed country (Maryland, USA), and developing country (Tasajera, El Salvador), with the goal of conducting actionable science to improve natural resource management. Additionally, Daniel is the founder in El Salvador of a grassroots sustainable development initiative, EMANA, that has supported science-based community development interventions in coastal villages within a marine protected area.

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June 28, 2019

Huracan, Tormenta, Storm: Winds of Change - In this podcast by two Honors Humanities students, Michelle Eng and Lauren Hoorens, listen to an interview with Dr. Ana Sanchez-Rivera regarding Hurricane Maria's Effect on Puerto Rico. This episode was part of a class assignment.

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