Hispanic Studies Faculty Focus for February 2021 is Dr. Christina García
A member of Hispanic Studies since 2018, Dr. García holds a Ph.D. in Spanish from the University of California, Irvine (2018) [with a dissertation focusing on “Touching Impenetrable Bodies: Material Ecologies in Cuban Literary and Visual Works”], an M.A. from New York University (2009) in Humanities and Social Thought, and a B.A. in English and Art History from Florida International University (2004).
As one might expect, such a varied formation and background has resulted in a unique and fascinating research agenda, as well as in more than one engaging course offering—among the latter, the fancifully titled “Cannibal Readers,” “Sea Anemone, Roach-men and Hurricanes” and “Talking Trash and Wasting Time: A Caribbean Ecology”; among the former, “Of Souls, Skins and Leopard Prints: Queer and Animal Creations of Cubanbeings” (Revista de Estudios Hispánicos, June 2021), “Baroque Revolutionaries, Communist Fags and Risky Friendships: Reading the Politics of Friendship in Fresa y chocolate” (Cuban Studies 47, 2019) and “The Ethics of Botched Taxidermy” (Antennae: the Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, Issue 7, Autumn 2008).
In addition to the above, Dr. García has enriched the department in many other ways, ranging from her serving as Faculty Advisor to the College’s Hispanic Latino Club to her recent co-organizing of a poetry reading featuring renowned author Susannah Rodríguez Drissi.
For the above and for much else, Hispanic Studies is fortunate to count Dr. Christina García among its faculty and proud to be able to feature her as this month’s HISP Faculty Focus.
In her own words…
“I am always so impressed by how bright and socially engaged the students are at the College of Charleston. Whether it’s Spanish 101 that I’m teaching, or a senior seminar, I love rereading works of fiction and analyzing visual art with them. The students here have diverse cultural and socio-economic backgrounds and, in drawing from their lived experiences, their interpretations enrich and revitalize the objects we study. Teaching them is the best gig!”