On Friday, February 7th, the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (CLACS) held its annual Student Graduate Research Fellowship (SGRF) Conference at the Campus Instructional Facility (CIF). The event brought together students from various fields to explore pressing topics surrounding Latin American and Caribbean societies, policies, activism, and environmental challenges. 

We thank all of our presenters, discussants, and attendees for making this year’s conference a memorable and enriching experience for the CLACS community:

• Dissident Languages and the Politics of Care in Bolivia
  Speaker: Margie Giacolone, Anthropology

• (Making) Peasants Count: A Case Study of Rural Community Informatics towards Alternative Just Futures in the Colombian Amazon
  Speaker: Claudia Grisales, Informatics

• Nostalgic Testimonies: Post-dictatorship and Trauma in Brazil and Venezuela
  Speaker: Daniel Perez-Astros, Spanish and Portuguese

• Discussant: Sofia Zaragocin, Associate Professor in Geography & GIS

• The Deterritorialization of Urban Communities as a Public Policy of Social Exclusion: The Case of the Fishing Communities of Bode, Recife (Brazil)
  Speaker: Celio Moura, Geography

• Emergent Activist Possibilities in Nascent Authoritarian El Salvador
  Speaker: Jackie Abbing, Anthropology

• Navigating the Political Landscape: Exploring the Impact of National-Level Polarization on Local Elections in Brazil
  Speaker: Larissa Migotto, Political Science

• Understanding the Impact of Surveillance Technologies on Afro-Brazilian Communities
  Speaker: Kainen Bell, I-School

• Discussant: Jose Atiles, Associate Professor in the Sociology Department

• Quality Certification in Higher Education: Evidence from Chile
  Speaker: Cristhian Molina, Economics

• A Decade of Lei de Cotas in Brazil: An Analysis of Its Effectiveness
  Speaker: Otavio Barros, CLACS

• A Policy of Unprecedented Mutilations in Everyday Work: Re-orientations in Labor, Inequality, and SMEs in Chile
  Speaker: Adrian Wong, Institute of Communication Research

• Discussant: Carolina Rocha, Spanish Professor at Illinois Abroad and Global Exchange Department

• The World is a Garden: Classic Maya Environmental-Human-Animal Relationships
  Speaker: Yifan Wang, Anthropology

• Contesting Environmental Assessment Systems in Chile
  Speaker: Daniela Morales

• Rethinking the Urban as a Space of Liquid Modernity: The Case of Mexico City
  Speaker: Ilaria Strocchia

• Reframing Urban Sustainability through the Perspective of Socio-Economic Insurgent Practice
  Speaker: Luisa Fernandez

• Discussant: Kasia Szremski, Associate Director CLACS