CHAIR OF THE DEPARTMENT:
Associate Professor Gerard L. Aching

DIRECTOR OF GRADUATE STUDIES:
Associate Professor Gabriela Basterra

The Department of Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures offers comprehensive training in Spanish, Spanish American, and Brazilian literatures.

The King Juan Carlos I of Spain Chair and the Andrés Bello Chair bring distinguished scholars of Spanish and Spanish American culture to the University. The Albert Schweitzer Program in the Humanities, established by the Board of Regents of the State of New York, sponsors lectures, public readings, and seminars, often interdisciplinary in nature, by distinguished writers and critics. The King Juan Carlos I of Spain Center and the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies enable New York University to further strengthen its academic courses for the study of Spain, Latin America, and the Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking worlds. Both centers develop interdisciplinary programs focusing on the social sciences and the humanities.

The department collaborates on special programs with other cultural institutions in the city, including the Spanish Institute, the Americas Society, and the Instituto Cervantes, and with the national consulates of Spain and Latin America. Activities have included roundtables, symposia, and film festivals.

The NYU in Madrid program is the oldest and most distinguished program of its kind, providing an unparalleled opportunity to study with Spanish scholars and writers. It offers the M.A. degree in Spanish and Latin American languages and literatures with a concentration in either Spanish language and translation or Spanish and Latin American literatures and cultures.

Faculty

Gerard L. Aching, Associate Professor; Chair, Department of Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures. Ph.D. 1991 (Romance studies), Cornell; B.A. 1982 (political science), California (Berkeley).
Contemporary Caribbean literatures; Afro-Caribbean cultures and literature; modernism and the avant-garde in Spanish America; slavery and philosophy; cultural theories, criticism, and politics; visual culture.

Helene M. Anderson, Professor. Ph.D. 1961 (Latin American literature), M.A. 1952 (Hispanic literature), Syracuse; B.A. 1947 (Spanish and English literature), Brooklyn College (CUNY).
Nineteenth- and 20th-century Latin American literature in historical context; contemporary women writers of Mexico; politics and literature in Latin America; pre-Columbian cultures of Mexico.

Miriam de Mello Ayres, Senior Language Lecturer. Ph.D. 1995 (Spanish and Portuguese), Yale; M.A. 1989 (Brazilian literature), Pontifical Catholic (Rio de Janeiro); B.A. 1985 (Latin and classics), Federal (Rio de Janeiro).
Methodologies of foreign-language instruction; comparative literary and cultural studies: Brazil-Spanish America; 20th-century Brazilian literature; postcolonial Lusophone African literature; critical theory.

Gabriela Basterra, Associate Professor. Ph.D. 1997, M.A. 1990, Harvard; B.A. 1987, Zaragoza.
Modern and contemporary Spanish and Spanish American literature; poetry and poetic theory; creativity, artificiality, and agency; intelligibility in tragedy and modern subjectivity; the tension between ethics and politics; García Lorca; Emmanuel Levinas.

Ana María Dopico, Associate Professor, Comparative Literature, Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures. Ph.D. 1997 (comparative literature), M.Phil. 1993 (comparative literature), M.A. 1988 (English and comparative literature), Columbia; B.A. 1985 (English, history), Tufts.
Comparative literature of the Americas; literature and the nation; gender and culture; literature and cultural politics.

Georgina Dopico-Black, Associate Professor. Ph.D. 1995 (Spanish literature), Yale; B.A. 1986 (history and literature), Harvard.
Literature, history, and culture of early modern Spain; canon formation; early modern libraries; race and gender studies; cultural politics; contemporary literary and cultural theory and criticism.

James D. Fernández, Associate Professor. Ph.D. 1988 (Romance languages and literatures), Princeton; B.A. 1983, Dartmouth College.
Nineteenth- and 20th-century Spanish literature; autobiography in Spain; Peninsular and Latin American literary relations.

Sibylle Maria Fischer, Associate Professor. Ph.D. 1995 (comparative literature/Spanish and Portuguese), Columbia; M.A. 1987 (Latin American studies, philosophy, German literature), Free (Berlin).
Caribbean and Latin American literatures (Spanish, Portuguese, French); culture and politics in the 19th century; literature and philosophy; cultural, aesthetic, and political theory; the Black Atlantic; the Haitian Revolution.

Kenneth L. Krabbenhoft, Professor. Ph.D. 1982 (Spanish and Portuguese), M.A. 1979 (Spanish and Portuguese), New York; B.A. 1968 (Spanish and Portuguese), Yale.
Early modern Spanish rhetoric and poetics (Góngora, Quevedo, Gracián); the Western mystical tradition, especially the Spanish 16th century and the kabbalah of the Spanish diaspora; Portuguese and Brazilian literature (Clarice Lispector, Sofía de Melo, Pessoa, Saramago); science fiction; and translation.

Jill Lane, Assistant Professor; Associate Director, Hemispheric Institute. Ph.D. 2000 (performance studies), New York; M.A. 1991 (theatre arts), B.A. 1989 (comparative literature), Brown.
Comparative performance in the Americas; colonialism and neocolonialism; neoliberalism; performance and politics.

H. Salvador Martínez, Professor. Ph.D. 1972 (medieval Spanish literature and history), Toronto; Ph.D. 1966 (intellectual history, philosophy of history), Pontifical Gregorian.
Spanish medieval and Renaissance literature; cultural interrelations in medieval Spain; Romance philology.

Sylvia Molloy, Albert Schweitzer Professor of the Humanities; Professor, Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures, Comparative Literature. Doctorat d’Université 1967 (comparative literature), Licence ès Lettres et Littératures Modernes 1960, Paris (Sorbonne).
Contemporary Latin American literature; literary theory; autobiography in Latin America; comparative literature.

Judith K. Némethy, Clinical Associate Professor; Director, Spanish Language Studies. Ph.D. 1999 (Hispanic studies), Szeged; M.L.S. 1982 (library science), Syracuse; B.A. 1976 (French language and literature), Rutgers.
Foreign language methodology; second-language acquisition; curricular planning; teacher training; ethnic and minority studies; emigré literature.

Marta C. Peixoto, Associate Professor. Ph.D. 1977 (comparative literature), Princeton; B.A./M.A. 1970 (comparative literature), Brown.
Brazilian literature; modern poetry; feminist theory.

Mary Louise Pratt, Professor, Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures, Comparative Literature; Silver Professor. Ph.D. 1975 (comparative literature), Stanford; M.A. 1971 (linguistics), Illinois (Urbana-Champaigne); B.A. 1968 (modern languages and literature), Toronto.
Latin American literature and culture; literary and cultural theory; postcolonial and Empire studies; gender and culture; nonliterary narrative.

Kathleen A. Ross, Professor. Ph.D. 1985, M.Phil. 1981, M.A. 1979, Yale; B.A. 1977, New York.
Latin American colonial literature; translation theory and practice; women’s studies.

Eduardo Subirats, Professor. Ph.D. 1981, M.A. 1978, Barcelona.
Spanish intellectual history; the Counter-Reformation and the Conquest; the Enlightenment; avant-garde movements in Spain and Latin America; Spain’s transition to democracy.

Diana Taylor, Professor, Performance Studies, Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures; Director, Hemispheric Institute on Performance and Politics. Ph.D. 1981 (comparative literature), Washington; M.A. 1974 (comparative literature), National (Mexico); Certificat d’Études Supérieures 1972, Aix-Marseille; B.A. 1971 (creative writing), University of the Americas (Mexico).
Latin American and U.S. theatre and performance; performance and politics; feminist theatre and performance in the Americas.

George Yúdice, Professor, Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures, Program in Latin American and Caribbean Studies. Ph.D. 1977 (Romance languages), Princeton; M.A. 1971 (Spanish and Portuguese), Illinois; B.A. 1970 (Spanish and chemistry), Hunter College (CUNY).
Latin American avant-gardes; cultural studies; and cultural policy studies.

FACULTY EMERITI

John A. Coleman, John B. Hughes, Wilson Martins, Alice Pollin, Antonio Regalado, James Stamm.