Brazilian Scholars Enhance Latin American Studies Winter Quarter
By Karla Schneider
Assistant Director, Center for International Studies
For most residents of warm and sunny Niteroi, Brazil – a suburb of Rio de Janeiro - Athens, Ohio may seem an unlikely place to spend the months of January and February. This is not the first time, however, that scholars Wainer and Regina Silva have done just that - the pair are visiting scholars attached to Ohio University’s Latin American Studies Program for winter quarter.
An engineering professor and former Dean of engineering at the Universidade Federal Fluminense, Rio de Janeiro, Wainer Silva is teaching a course in the Department of Political Science on the politics of Brazil. Though not a political scientist by training, Silva has taken special courses on Brazilian politics and international relations at the prestigious Escola Superior de Guerra and has written a book on the same topic that he uses in his course.
Regina Silva, faculty member at Universidade Salgado de Oliveira, Rio de Janeiro, and alumna of Ohio University, is offering a public brown-bag lunch series on various topics relating to Brazilian communication and media. An overview of Brazilian history and politics was the topic for her first session on February 7 and a session on music as political expression during Brazil’s military dictatorship was held February 14. Additional lunch discussion topics will include Brazil’s famous telenovelas (television drama series) on February 21 and contemporary trends in Brazilian media on February 28. All of the brown-bag lunch discussions are held at 12:30pm in Yamada International House 009 and are open to the public.
According to Latin American Studies Director Betsy Partyka, interest in Brazilian studies is on the rise at Ohio University, the increase in Portuguese language class enrollments being one indicator. “Now that a study abroad program in Brazil is being approved, Regina Silva's cultural presentations are even more relevant,” she said. “From politics and music through the latest trends in Brazilian telenovelas, Dr. Silva's research interests touch many of our students' passions.”
Both Regina and Weiner Silva will present in a panel on Brazil at the Ohio Latin Americanist Conference that will be held at Ohio University on March 1.
The Latin American Studies Program is an interdisciplinary master’s degree program in the Center for International Studies that combines coursework in a variety of disciplines to produce graduates who are well-versed in the cultural, institutional, and economic realities of Latin America. The only program of its kind offering a master’s degree focused on the region in the State of Ohio, the Latin American Studies Program also offers a critical language sequence in Portuguese. Learn more about the program at http://www.ohiou.edu/latinamerican/
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