Latin American & Caribbean Studies Graduate Minor

for the Graduate Minor in Latin American & Caribbean Studies

Including classroom and online courses in Quechua, the most spoken native language in the American continent.

The graduate minor in Latin American and Caribbean Studies promotes training for Master’s and Doctoral students in other disciplines interested in complementing their degree program with an interdisciplinary perspective on Latin America and the Caribbean region. There are no prerequisites for the graduate minor. The Center will provide an online admission form to be submitted to the student’s advisor for review. The form will require the student's graduate advisor and program director approval. Applicants must be in good standing in a graduate program at the University of Illinois and should demonstrate an interest in Latin American Studies.

Note: Students within the major cannot minor in the same program.

Graduate Degree Programs in Latin American & Caribbean Studies

Latin American Studies, MA

Graduate Minor in Latin American & Caribbean Studies

The Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies administers a program of language and area courses leading to an interdisciplinary Master of Arts degree. The master's program facilitates studies in the languages, cultures, and affairs of the region for three constituencies of students: those seeking to match area expertise with professional training; those proceeding to disciplinary-based doctoral work; and those for whom the degree would stand on its own. The center also administers graduate specializations in Latin American and Caribbean Studies with various departments. The center is a Title VI National Resource Center. The center houses the Lemann Institute for Brazilian Studies.

Language Instruction

The Center offers 3 levels of Quechua, the most spoken language in the American continent, with approximately 13 million of speakers in 6 countries. The Center also offers Quechua online courses and free access to the publication Correo de Linguistica Andina and free exercises on Quechua. Visit www.clacs.illinois.edu/quechua/.

Other languages in the University that fulfill the M.A. requirements are Spanish and Portuguese, both offered at the School Literatures, Cultures, and Linguistics.

Faculty Research Interests

More than 100 faculty throughout the University are currently affiliated with the Center. The Center's faculty devote all or a portion of their teaching and research to Latin American subjects, from agriculture to politics, culture and linguistics. Their expertise spans every important discipline and sub-region of Latin America and the Caribbean, with particular strength in the Andean countries, the Caribbean, lowland South America, Mexico, and Brazil.

For a complete list of our affiliated faculty and their research and teaching interests check our people page at http://www.clacs.illinois.edu/about/people/faculty.aspx.

Facilities and Resources

Latin American Library Collection (LALC)

The Center assist the Latin American Collection at the University Library in purchasing teaching and research materials to develop a strong collection that supports teaching and research in those programs sponsored and coordinated by the Center as well as interdisciplinary courses with Latin American subject matter offered by other departments.

The LACL collection ranks among the six largest in the country and is the largest collection in the Midwest region in purchasing teaching and research materials to develop a strong collection that supports teaching and research in those programs sponsored and coordinated by the Center as well as interdisciplinary courses with Latin American subject matter offered by other departments. It is located in the third floor of the main UIUC library in room 324 and while the Library itself does not house a circulating collection, our knowledgeable staff is available to help locate relevant materials, answer reference questions, and assist you in developing effective searching strategies.

The Latin American and Caribbean Library collection includes:

More than 400,000 monograph titles;
Newspapers and magazines from over 20 Latin American and Caribbean countries;
A strong collection of journals in the humanities and social sciences, as well as publications of professional associations, government agencies, central banks, and non-governmental organizations;
Access to HAPI Online (Hispanic American Periodicals Index), the Handbook of Latin American Studies, and other online databases;
An extensive collection of videos available at the Media Center in the Undergraduate Library;
over 32,000 maps of Latin America (housed in the Map and Geography Library);
comprehensive holdings of Brazilian and Andean materials;
Extensive holdings by and about Gabriel Garcia Marquez;
Publications from the Archivo General de la Nacion de Mexico; and
A comprehensive Latin American music collection.

List-serv

The Center administers a listserv with more than 500 subscribers. Weekly mass messages "CALCS/Lemann Institute this Week" contain information on activities in campus related to Latin America and the Caribbean region (conferences, workshops, movies), new courses and job positions as well as future conferences in other Universities. To subscribe contact: Angelina Cotler (cotler@illinois.edu).

CLACS Brownbags

Every Thursday at Noon in Room 101 International Studies Building (910 S. Fifth Street in Champaign) CLACS presents a lecture offered by a faculty, graduate student or outside faculty on topics relevant to the region. These are open and free brownbag lectures. For complete list of presentations during the semester visit our website on the events section.

Opportunities and Events

The Center keeps update a complete list of jobs, grants, conferences, and fellowships in the U.S. and abroad for graduate students and faculty. Check it at http://www.clacs.illinois.edu/news/opportunities.aspx.

Outreach Program

One of the goals of our mission is to increase knowledge and awareness of Latin America and the Caribbean in the educational community and the general public by promoting language and area studies in their broadest sense. Outreach at CLACS is a service-oriented program funded through a Title VI Federal Area Studies grant. It is designed to increase public knowledge about Latin America and the Caribbean and Latin American and Caribbean peoples and cultures. All our services are free!
Services include

Speakers Bureau composed by graduate students and faculty for presentations in schools on Latin American topics.
Outreach Library for k-14 teachers and instructors that includes books and DVDs.
Collaborates with the Illinois International Review, the University of Illinois' new international publication; produces CLACS this Week, a weekly Calendar of Events; and an annual newsletter on Quechua instruction, Correo de Linguistica Andina.
Publishes several curriculum development workbooks including: Columbus: Beyond the Myth, A Teacher's Workbook on Tropical Rain Forests, and Historia Oral: The Latina/o Experience in the United States.
Organizes the Latin American Brownbag Colloquium, a weekly series of noon seminars in which faculty, students, and visiting scholars present current research and speak on topics of special interest. Additionally, the Center sponsors many cultural events, such as Latin American music and dance ensembles, and art exhibitions.
Maintains links to Web based curriculum-related materials on its outreach Web pages as a means of facilitating access to curriculum resources and research materials on Latin America and the Caribbean.

For more information visit http://www.clacs.illinois.edu/outreach/default.aspx.

Links

Links to local museums, units and clubs that offer Latin American and Caribbean services as well as external links to institutions abroad and in the U.S. www.clacs.illinois.edu/resources/.

Financial Aid

The Center is a recipient of Federal Government Title VI Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowships for Graduate Studies in any discipline that includes a specialization in Latin American Studies and an intensive program of language instruction. Academic year language courses and summer fellowships for intensive language courses abroad or in the United States are available. Information on how to apply, requirements and datelines are posted in http://publish.illinois.edu/illinoisflas/.

The Center offers Tinker Summer Fellowship Research Grants for graduate students in any department wishing to do research during the summer in Latin America, the Caribbean and the Iberian Peninsula. Both these programs depend on outside funding and thus cannot be guaranteed in any given year. Information on how to apply, requirements and datelines are posted in http://www.clacs.illinois.edu/academics/fellowships/tinker.aspx.

for the Graduate Minor in Latin American & Caribbean Studies

For additional details and requirements refer to the department's graduate program information online and the Graduate College Handbook.

Note: Students within the major cannot minor in the same program.

Course List
Code	Title	Hours
Area Courses: 400-/500-level courses from two different departments from a list approved by CLACS every semester and posted in our website and announced through our listserv		8
Language coursework taken on this campus in either Portuguese, Spanish or Native American Language or Haitian Creole, OR the language course could also be selected from the area courses offered in these languages, i.e. literature class taught in any of these languages.		4
The chosen language course must be at the 400-or 500 level to count towards the required 12 hours for Graduate Minor.
Total Hours		12

Other Requirements

Grad Other Degree Requirements
Requirement	Description
If the student's master's thesis or doctoral dissertation deals with Latin America and the Caribbean, students are strongly recommended that a faculty member from the Center be a formal member of their committee