Meet Our Grad Students

photo collage of graduate students

Our diverse student body comes from 12 countries and 6 US states and many are first generation graduate students. Learn more about their research interests below and check out our program news too!

José Aguirre Pombo
Ana Forcinito and Bill Viestenz, advisors
Research interests include: Transatlantic Studies, Contemporary Iberian and Latin American Cinema and Visual Arts, Memory Studies and the depiction of Mass Violence, and relations between Politics and Animistic Thought.
Catalina Ahumada Escobar
Raúl Marrero-Fente, advisor
My research interest focuses on letters and  women letter-writing and their relationship with the expression of emotions in 19th Century Colombia.

Ariel Arjona
Ana Paula Ferreira, advisor

My research interests include the formation of national identities in the Caribbean with a focus on Literature, Art, Architecture and Philosophy.

Camille Braun
Ofelia Ferrán and Bill Viestenz, advisors

My research focuses on contemporary narratives of substance use disorder in Spain.

Jacob Dixon
Sophia Beal and Ana Paula Ferreira, advisors

I am interested in Lusophone music - especially how it intersects with gender and capitalism

Sara Gardner

My research interests center around the culinary heritage and cultural identity of Sephardic Jews in Medieval Iberia.

Alexander Korte

My research interests include 13th century clerical poetry and adventure tales. My dissertation focuses on piracy and human trafficking in medieval Iberian literature.

Magaly Ortiz

Medieval and Early Modern Iberian literatures, cultures, and gender studies.  Mediterranean Studies. Captivity. The veil: dress and symbolism.

Olga Salazar Pozos

My research interest focuses on the representation of patterns of violence and human rights violations in contemporary Mexican and Latin American literature.

Thiago Santana

My primary research interests include Latin American literatures and cultures, early modern studies, neoclassicism, aesthetics, literary theory, and political philosophy.

Alejandra Takahira

Feminist and gender studies, critical race, and Latin American cinema and literature. Also, Asian-Latin American identities and transnational identities, and their particular cultural perspective and expression.

Carlos Villanueva

I am interested in 20th and 21st century Central American literature and testimony as well as social and revolutionary movements in Central America, family narratives, and colonialism and decoloniality.

Javier Zapata Sound studies; Cervantes; Golden Age
William Cornejo Moreira
Tim Face, advisor

Bilingualism/phonology

Catalina Ahumada Escobar
Raúl Marrero-Fente, advisor
My research interest focuses on letters and  women letter-writing and their relationship with the expression of emotions in 19th Century Colombia.
Perla Escobar
Carol Klee, advisor

Perceptions of Spanish with heritage learners

Sabrina Fluegel
Carol Klee and Kendall King, advisors
My research interests include context of learning, dialect acquisition, and the effects of study abroad on L2 abilities. Additionally, I am interested in studying language use in social media and instructional materials.
Vivian Franco Díaz
Mandy Menke, advisor
Spanish SLA; second language writing; heritage language development; sociolinguistics; Spanish in the U.S.; language ideologies and identity; discourse analysis; multicultural education; and Spanish Heritage Language Education.
Yoko Hama
Carol Klee, advisor
Yoko is a PhD student specializing in Hispanic Linguistics. Their research interests include sociolinguistics, language contact, language and identity, especially in the context of Asian diaspora communities in Spanish speaking countries.
Jacky James
Carol Klee, advisor
Spanish language contact and change and use of inclusive language
Raegeom Lee
Mandy Menke and Francisco Ocampo, advisors
I am interested in Second Language Acquisition - specifically on teaching Spanish to speakers of Korean. My research also includes the use of irony as a teaching tool.
Marie Mangold
Mandy Menke, advisor
My research interests include second language acquisition, bilingual and immersion education, Spanish for heritage speakers, and sociolinguistics.

Celeste Morales
Carol Klee, advisor

My research interests include Spanish as a Heritage Language, sociolinguistics, language ideology and identity, content-based language instruction, Spanish SLA, language immersion education, and second language teaching.
James Ramsburg
Carol Klee and Francisco Ocampo, advisors
My research interests include historical sociolinguistics, language contact, Belearic Catalan, language and cognition, and discourse analysis.
Leiry Warren
Carol Klee and Mandy Menke, advisors
My research interests include Second Language Acquisition, Strategic Competence, Scenarios and Communicative strategies to help students to communicate in an effective way, using what they know without feeling limitation using Spanish.