The Latin American and Latino Studies Program hosted an event last Wednesday titled "Our America/Nuestra America: The Future of Area Studies" in honor of its 50th anniversary. The event featured a panel consisting of three distinguished alumni who spoke on their experiences in the program: Frances Hagopian '75, Peter Kornbluh '78 and Jeff Arak '07.

Hagopian, the Lemann Visiting Associate Professor for Brazil Studies at the department of government at Harvard University and faculty chair of the Brazil studies program of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies, spoke first.
Hagopian described her initial reason for becoming involved in Latin American studies. "I thought I was going to take a European politics class, and I went to the first class ... and [the professor] said, 'I don't want you in this class if you don't know X, Y and Z,' and I thought, 'I don't know X, Y and Z,'" she said during the event. "So I said to my boyfriend at the time, 'What am I going to do?'"

Hagopian's boyfriend at the time had been taking a Latin American history class, which he invited her to take with him. "It was the beginning of a lifelong love," she said. "I dropped the boyfriend; Latin America has been with me ever since."

Hagopian travelled to Chile in during the summer of 1974 as a part of her senior thesis, which focused on the fall of the Chilean regime in September 1973. Since then, she has written several books and continues with similar research. In addition, she advises and educates both graduate and undergraduate students, with emphasis on democratization, political representation, political economy, religion and politics.

Kornbluh, director of the National Security Archive's Chile Documentation Project and of the Cuba Documentation Project, writes and researches U.S. foreign policy in Latin America. As a writer and an awarded journalist, he has been featured in such publications as the Washington Post and the New York Times.

Similar to Hagopian, his senior thesis discussed the situation in Chile; however, his focus was on U.S. intervention. According to Kornbluh, he noticed an article written by former U.S. ambassador to Chile, Edward Korry, regarding his discontentment with President Richard Nixon and then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

Kornbluh immediately sought to contact Korry to interview him for his senior thesis. "I saw the opportunity and thought, 'This will get me highest honors,'" said Kornbluh.

Kornbluh drove to meet Korry in Connecticut, prepared only with a 60-minute cassette tape. Seven hours after the tape ran out, Korry was still reading confidential documents to Korbluh. Kornbluh was able to use these confidential documents that Korry had shared with him in the interview. "I got highest honors," Kornbluh said.

Arak, an up-and-coming documentary filmmaker, directed video portraits, as well as his newly-released film Life on Death Beach about a group of volunteer lifeguards in a town on the cost of Oaxaca, Mexico.

Arak plans to pursue a career in filmmaking and producing documentaries. "Documentaries can really be a catalyst for conversation," Arak said.

Arak emphasized the importance of working in Latin America to gain cultural competence. "Working in Mexico added a style of closeness to my work," he said.

During the question-and-answer session following the panel discussion, several inquirers asked about the panelists' thoughts on the small number of students enrolled in area studies programs such as the Latin American and Latino Studies Program.

It was asserted during the event by both the panelists and participants that students who would be interested in Latin American and Latino Studies have been choosing to major in International and Global Studies for a broader education. However, the importance of area studies and the continued existence of the program were defended by the panelists. "Area studies help us understand reality in the arts as opposed to holding onto stereotypes," said Arak.

As the panelists persistently mentioned throughout the discussion, Brandeis' program was initiated during a time when such emphasis on Latin American area studies was uncommon in universities. "Never forget that this program was founded in a very special context," Hagopian said. "It was one of the most exciting intellectual experiments in the history of higher education when it started, and creating programs like this one was part of that intellectual ferment."