CULTURAL STUDIES IN GRADUATE PROGRAMMES IN LATIN AMERICA

Abstract

In this article, we describe the eccentric location of Cultural Studies in the Latin American academy: while it remains marginal in terms of institutional recognition, it is nevertheless important in terms of the interest it arouses in professors and students alike, and in the amount and quality of publications in the area. The field's general flexibility appeals both to many established researchers, who employ its methodologies to expand the scope of their investigations, and to many students, who become frustrated with disciplinary rigidity and with the difficulty in carrying out academic projects with overtly political underpinnings from the traditional disciplines of the humanities and social sciences. While student demand is clearly strong in much of Latin America, the response to the rise of Cultural Studies in the Latin American academy has taken two general forms: (1) an opening up of spaces within existing disciplines (anthropology, communications, literature, etc.) for the more interdisciplinary or politicized work and (2) the foundation of new programmes in Cultural Studies. We use as examples the case studies of Argentina and Colombia, countries that have a completely different academic history and tradition. We survey the diverse ways in which Cultural Studies has entered institutional spaces in both countries. Colombia offers the case of an academy that appears to have welcomed the institutionalization of Cultural Studies, at least superficially, while Argentina appears to have resisted ceding the field institutional space. Nonetheless, its presence in both countries is strongly palpable; it is clearly a force too strong to be suppressed by resistance from the traditional disciplines.

Keywords:

• Cultural Studies
• Latin America
• Colombia
• Argentina
• discipline
• graduate

Notes

1. We are indebted to faculty from the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana: Juan Carlos Segura, Carlos Arturo López and especially director Marta Cabrera; the Universidad de Los Andes: director Alcira Saavedra, Chloe Rutter-Jensen, Gregory Lobo, Juan Ricardo Aparicio, along with administrator Julia Morales; and the Universidad Nacional: director Marta Zambrano, for discussing with us the history and administration of their programmes. We also thank the following graduate students who agreed to be interviewed from the Javeriana: Érika Casteñeda, Tania Lizarazo, Ruth Vargas Rincón and Daniela Díaz Soto and the Universidad de Los Andes: Ángela Lozano, Diana Pardo, Marcela Rojas Peralta, Catalina Vallejo, Sonia Abaunza Galvis and Ángela Vera Ruiz about their interest in and experience with Cultural Studies (see Lagos et al. 2010).

2. For sharing their experience as faculty and graduate students in Cultural Studies we are indebted the following: at the University of Buenos Aires, Pablo Alabarces, Valeria Añón, Ana Wortman and to the graduate students in Ph.D. seminar ‘Pensar la cultura: nuevos enfoques, nuevas lecturas’ (September–November 2009); at the Universidad Nacional de San Martín, Alejandro Grimson; at the Universidad Nacional de Quilmes, Dora Barrancos and the students in the Ph.D. seminar ‘Debates actuales en los estudios culturales latinoamericanos’ (June–September 2009); at the Universidad de Tucumán, Josefina Doz Costa, Ricardo Kaliman, and Denisse Oliszewski; and to Beatriz Ocampo of the Universidad Nacional de Santiago del Estero.