LAS Affiliated Faculty

The following faculty members are appointed in cognate units across the university. Their research and teaching focusses on Latin America and Latin American Studies from a range of disciplinary angles. The Latin American Studies Program in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Toronto welcomes the participation of our affiliated faculty in our Advisory Committee, our research colloquia, the supervision of undergraduate research initiatives, and other activities that strengthen our Latin American Studies community within and beyond the university.

Updated: April 7, 2021. List is alphabetical by last name.

Name Academic Unit Research Interests Website
Christian Abizaid Geography and School for the Environment Environment and development; Indigenous and peasant livelihoods and resource use in Latin America; Vulnerability and resilience; Rural poverty; Forest and biodiversity conservation; Social networks; Neotropical forests, mainly Amazonia and Mexico. Co-Principal Investigator on the Peruvian Amazon Rural Livelihoods and Poverty (PARLAP) Project.  Profile in Geography & Planning
Andrea Allen Anthropology and Diaspora Studies Socio-cultural anthropology; Diaspora and transnationalism; Gender and sexuality; Race; Religion; Queer anthropology; Violence, subjectivity, and embodiment. Profile in Anthropology
Martha Balaguera Political Science Collective political struggles in violent contexts, with an emphasis on transborder forms of activism in the Americas from a feminist perspective. Profile in Political Science - UTM
Anne-Emanuelle Birn International Development and Public Health History of public health in Latin America (Mexico, Uruguay); Global/international health policy and politics, past and present; Historical demography – infant mortality; Comparative health policy (Latin America); Health and medicine in Cold War Latin America; Extractive industries and health; Primary health care, social justice, and international (health) politics in the 1980s and 1990s. Profile in Dalla Lana School of Public Health
Gustavo J. Bobonis Economics Economic development; Labour economics; Political economy; Economic history. Profile in Economics
Kevin P. Coleman Historical Studies Modern Latin American History; Visual Culture; History of Capitalism; U.S.-Latin American Relations. Profile in Historical Studies - UTM
Laura Doering Rotman Economic sociology; Effects of social psychological processes on economic behaviors in both developing and advanced economies. Profile in Rotman
Jerry Flores Sociology Studies of gender and crime; Prison studies; Alternative schools; Ethnographic research methods; Latina/o sociology; Correctional education; Intersectionality and criminology and studies of race and ethnicity. Profile in Sociology - UTM
Bernardo García Domínguez New College / Caribbean Studies Sociology of religion; Cuba.  
Rubén Gaztambide-Fernández OISE Pedagogic theory; Educational theory; Curriculum theory; Cultural production and solidarity. Profile in OISE
Gustavo Indart Economics Economic development; International economics  Profile in Economics
Ryan Isakson Geography & Planning Political economy of food and agrarian development; Financialization of food and agriculture; Peasant livelihoods and agricultural biodiversity; Land reform and agrarian transformation; Latin America; Political ecology; Critical Development Studies Profile in Geography & Planning
Justin Jennings Royal Ontario Museum / Anthropology Archaelogy; Latin America; Peru.

Profile in ROM
Profile in Anthropology

Donald Kingsbury Political Science Latin American and North Atlantic comparative political theory; Latin American politics; Developmentalism and neoliberalism; Marxism; Cultural Studies. Profile in Political Science
Teresa Kramarz Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy Global environmental governance, international organizations and public-private partnerships. Profile in Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy
Christopher Krupa Anthropology Violence; Racial capitalism; (Post)coloniality; State and Para-State complexes; Political affect and embodiment; Plantation systems; Labour, debt and finance; Critical race theory; History and historicity; Primitive accumulation. Profile in Anthropology
Patricia Landolt Sociology Global migrations; Refugee-migrant political incorporation; Precarious work and income insecurity; Non-citizenship and precarious legal status; International migration, immigrant incorporation and transnationalism; Ethnicity and racialization. Profile in Sociology
Evonne Levy Art History Early Modern art; Baroque art & architecture; Historiography of Art. Profile in Art History
Suzi Lima Linguistics Cognitive science; Linguistic theory; Language documentation; Formal semantics; Psycholinguistics; Language acquisition; Brazilian Portuguese; Brazilian indigenous languages. Profile in Linguistics
Pedro Mateo Pedro Linguistics Language variation and change; Linguistic theory; Documentation and acquisition of Mayan languages of Guatemala and Mexico; Q'anjob'al, Mam, Ch'ol, Chuj; Development of verb morphology in Q'anjob'al and Chuj. Profile in Linguistics
Sharlene Mollet Critical Development Studies and Human Geography Land and natural resource conflicts; Political ecology and feminist political ecology; Latin America, Honduras, Panama; Development geography; Race, gender and property rights; Indigenous peoples and Afro-descendant communities; Feminist and postcolonial geographies; Residential tourism. Profile in Human Geography - UTSC
Julie Moreau Political Science Transnational queer politics; Social movements; Citizenship; Latin America; Africa Profile in Political Science
Lena Mortensen Anthropology Heritage, identity and politics of the past; Tourism, representation, and commodification of Culture; Ethnography of Archaeology; Material culture; Globalization and development. Profile in Anthropology - UTSC
Mariana Mota Prado Law Law and development; Corruption and comparative law.   Profile in Law
Valentina Napolitano Anthropology Political theology; Personhood; Theopolitics and critical Catholic studies; Gender and affects; Religious infrastructures and architecture; Affective histories; Transnational migration; Anthropology of traces; The Vatican; Mexico; Italy; Detroit/Windsor corridor. Profile in Anthropology
Melanie J. Newton History Atlantic World; Conflict, violence and genocide; Gender, sex, and sexualities; Latin America and Caribbean; Social. Profile in History
Kevin L. O'Neill           Study of Religion Christianity; Religion, culture & politics; Religion, ethics & modern thought; Diaspora and transnationalism; Religion in the Americas; History of religions; Ethnographic inquiry. Profile in Religion
Jeff Packman Music History and Culture Brazilian music; Popular music of the Americas; Cultural theory; Music and technoculture; Music cultures of Latin America and the Caribbean; Afrodiasporic performance; Race, social class, and cultural politics in relation to professional music making. Profile in Music
Jeffrey M. Pilcher Historical & Cultural Studies Food; Latin America and the Caribbean. Profile in Historical & Cultural Studies - UTSC
Luisa Farah Schwartzman Sociology Race and ethnicity; Diversity and multiculturalist policies; Relationship between race, ethnicity and the construction of nation-states in the Americas; Brazil. Profile in Sociology - UTM
Edward R. Swenson Anthropology Andes; Archaeological method and theory; Ritual, religion and ideology; Power and violence; Emergence of complex society; Pre-industrial city; Landscape history and place-making; Ancient Andes, Mesoamerica, Khmer civilization. Profile in Anthropology
Vannina Sztainbok OISE Anti-racist feminism, intersectionality; Racial inequality in the Americas; Race and psychoanalysis; Race and space; Afro-Latin American studies; Racism and anti-racism in the Southern Cone; Narratives of violence. Profile in OISE
Judith Teichman Political Science Politics and Policymaking in Latin America; Inequality, poverty and violence, especially in Mexico; Welfare regimes and social policy in the global south and Latin America. Profile in Political Science
D. Alissa Trotz Women & Gender Studies and Caribbean Studies Transnational feminist studies; Caribbean studies with a focus on radical intellectual traditions and feminist political economy; Transnational migration and diaspora; Social movements; Political violence; History, memory and archives. Profile in Women & Gender Studies
Luis van Isschot History Modern Latin America; Colombia; Human Rights; Inter-American Human Rights System; Social Movements; Violence; Authoritarianism; Revolutionary Movements. Profile in History
Marcelo Vieta OISE Workplace and organizational learning and change; Sociology of work; Alternative work organizations; Workers' control, participation, and self-management/autogestión; Political economy of labour; Social economy studies; Economic democracy, community development, and social justice; Philosophy of technology; Critical theory, with a focus on the Frankfurt School; Class-struggle Marxism; Social movements; Communication studies; Latin America (especially Argentina), Italy, Canada, and the US. Profile in OISE
Tamara Walker History History of slavery and freedom in Latin America; Racial formation in Latin America; Gender, enslavement and racialization. Profile in History