International and Global Studies, UNCG

	Latin American and Caribbean Studies Concentration Faculty Group
Chair	Verónica Grossi, Ph.D. (University of Texas at Austin) is an Associate Professor in the Romance Language Department and Director of Spanish Graduate Study. Her research interests include Spanish American Colonial literature, critical and feminist theory, Spanish American women writers, Spanish American poetry and 20th century Mexican literature.
	Omar H. Ali, Ph.D. (Columbia University) is Associate Professor of African American and Diaspora History, African American Studies Program, UNCG. Born in Lima, Peru, Dr. Ali explores black resistance to slavery, marronage, and abolitionism in Latin America, among other areas of the African Diaspora. His latest research looks at the intersection of Islam and the African Diaspora. He has been a Fulbright professor of history and anthropology at Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogota, and a Library Scholar at the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University.
	Clara M. Chu, Ph.D (University of Western Ontario) specializes in multicultural library and information services, information seeking behavior, and critical information studies. Her other research interests include multicultural education, organization of information, international and comparative information services, and transnational ethnic studies (see Chinese in/from Latin America website or coloniachina wiki site)
	William Hamilton, Ph.D. (Tulane University) is a cultural historian with a long history of environmental activism. With degrees in philosophy, theology, and history, he has taught courses in the philosophy of the environment, philosophy of religion, the history of moral philosophy, and environmental writing. Dr. Hamilton spent a decade in Latin America, working with ecumenical human rights and education agencies as a researcher, editor, and grass-roots organizer. Previously, he taught at universities in Louisiana and Indiana before coming to UNCG in 2004.
	Fabrice Lehoucq, Ph.D. (Duke University) is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at UNCG. His areas of instruction include comparative politics, Latin American Politics, and the Political Economy of Development.
	H. Nolo Martínez, Ph.D.(North Carolina State University), a Puerto Rican native, is a Research Scientist at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro, Department of Social Work where he serves as the Director of the UNCG Center for New North Carolinians. In 1998, North Carolina Governor James B. Hunt Jr. appointed Dr. Martinez as the first Director of Hispanic/Latino Affairs, a position he served in for six years. Dr. Martinez has held a number of positions focused on working with immigrant groups.
	Joan Paluzzi, Ph.D. (University of Pittsburgh) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at UNCG. Dr. Paluzzi, is also affiliated with Partners in Health — a non-profit organization which helps to fund health projects in several countries in the developing world.
	Linda Rupert, Ph.D., (Duke University) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of History at UNCG. Her research interests include early modern Atlantic and Caribbean, Colonial Americas, comparative slavery & slave societies, historical geography & cartography, and comparative maritime history.
	Alejandro Rutty, Ph.D. (State University of New York at Buffalo), Assistant Professor of Composition, joined the School of Music faculty in 2007. Composer, conductor and music advocate, his output includes work in avant-garde, classical, and Argentine traditional repertoires, as well as innovative community-based projects. His education includes a PhD in Composition, and degrees from The University of New Mexico and Universidad Católica Argentina.
	Mark Smith-Soto, Ph.D. (University of California at Berkeley) is Professor of Spanish in the UNCG Department of Romance Languages. His research interests include 19th- and 20th-century Latin American poetry and creative writing.