Dr. Fernando Feliu-Moggi, Professor of Spanish, Department of Languages and Cultures, was recently awarded a CU Diversity and Inclusive Excellence grant to support the Latin American Artist Speaker Series at UCCS.
For more than a decade the speaker series, formally known as the Spanish Cultures Speaker Series, has allowed for the engagement of artists, academics, and intellectuals from Latin America focusing on issues of diversity and inclusiveness with students, faculty and members of the UC community, creating a productive dialogue that has greatly benefited students, as well as local, regional and international populations. Co-funded by a variety of departments and programs at UCCS (including Languages and Cultures, Humanities, Visual and Performing Arts, Anthropology, the Office of the Dean of LAS, Women and Ethnic Studies, Geography and Environmental Studies, among others), the series has allowed for opportunities for cultural exchange and exploration, student academic and service travel, student and faculty academic and professional engagement at various levels, while also benefiting participating members and their communities, including immigrant and indigenous communities in Colorado and New Mexico as well as Guatemala, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, and Ecuador.
The grant will allow a more stable resource to cover the expenses of visiting artists and scholars in 2020. Guests this semester will be Dr. Laura August, an art curator and writer from Houston who works on Guatemalan contemporary art, and Jesús Sepúlveda, a poet and environmental activist from Chile. Guatemalan artist Delia Cumez is expected this summer. Additional speakers will visit during the fall semester.