5:00–8:00 p.m.
Please join Women in Graduate Sciences for our 11th Annual Fundraising Gala. We are hosting two back-to-back events designed to provide an engaging and informative evening celebrating women and marginalized genders in STEM!
From 5 to 6 PM, join us for a cocktail hour where community members are invited to learn about WGS's initiatives, meet our executive board, and hear from WGS members, including scholarship winners and our outreach team. Stay for the main event from 6-8 PM, where we welcome everyone for a buffet style dinner, banquet raffle, and exciting seminar by Dr. Laura Ackerman-Biegasiewicz, an Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Emory University whose research focuses on developing technology for accelerating reaction discovery in sustainable chemistry.
As the annual WGS fundraising benefit, the event offers a sliding scale of ticket prices ($50 for students, $100 for non-students, and $800 for an 8-person table). Purchase tickets or donate to WGS.
3:00–4:30 p.m.
Native American and Indigenous Research Colloquium
Students from the UO School for Architecture and Environment have been working with NILI (Northwest Indigenous Language Institute) and Native American and Indigenous Studies on a project focused on Native Language learning, preservation, and revitalization. This project has two design stages: first, the renovation of the current infrastructure of the NILI house based on a real demand; second, a speculative proposal with the intention to expand the preservation and revitalization of the Native Languages to a broader audience.
Join students as they share their proposals imagining how languages can be expressed and celebrated in diverse and inclusive ways, creating a dynamic cultural space for the community.
noon
Enjoy stress-free time together with disabled and neurodivergent graduate students from across campus. Share experiences, exchange resources, or consult with a GE from the Accessible Education Center.
noon
New Faculty Roundtable & Lunch April 15 / 12pm-1:30pm / EMU Miller Room
The Center for Latino/a and Latin American Studies (CLLAS) is pleased to to announce a dynamic roundtable discussion featuring new UO faculty members across various departments who specialize in Latino/a and Latin American studies! We are excited to welcome:
Naomi Sussman – Assistant Professor, History Research Interests: Indigenous history, borderlands history, sovereignty, citizenship, race, history of migration
Isabel García Valdivia – Assistant Professor, Sociology Research Interests: [Im]migration, Race and Ethnicity, Social Stratification, and Life course/Aging
Guillem Belmar Viernes – Assistant Professor, Linguistics Research Interests: Language revitalization, language maintenance, language rights, minoritized languages, endangered languages, language documentation, minority multilingualism, Minoritized Languages and (Social Media), Minoritized Language Translation, and more
Please join us in welcoming these faculty members to UO and learning about their research, coursework, and the valuable contributions they will make in educating students about Latinx and Latin American issues across various disciplines.
Lunch will be provided. We hope to see you there!
11:30 a.m.–1:00 p.m.
Connect with International students across campus to share experiences, exchange knowledge, and develop a network of support. Drop-ins are welcome and lunch will be served.
3:30–5:00 p.m.
Nurturing Resilience in the Face of Adversity: Women, Youth, and Caregiver Experiences in Latin America
April 17 / 3:30pm-5pm / EMU Crate Laker North (EMU 146)
Join us for a research colloquium as we explore the intersections of violence, empowerment, and resilience among women and youth in Latin America. Two researchers, Audrey Sileci (PhD Student, Prevention Science) and Gloria Macedo Janto (Graduate Student, Romance Languages), will present their research on women, youth, and caregiver experiences amid adversity and violence in Honduras and Peru.
Audrey Sileci will discuss her research on the Miles de Manos (MdM) program, a violence prevention initiative implemented in Honduras to promote a culture of peace and non-violence among children, parents, and teachers. Her presentation will delve into the program's impact on caregivers and their relationships with their children, as well as the key factors that contribute to the program's effectiveness. By exploring the complexities of program implementation and its effects on caregivers and children, Sileci's research aims to provide a more nuanced understanding of the MdM program's potential to promote positive change.
Gloria Macedo Janto will share her research on the narratives of Andean women in the discourses of political violence in Peru (1980-2000). She will analyze how these women's stories contribute to our understanding of Peru's historical memory and the impact of political violence on their lives.
This event provides a platform for CLLAS-funded researchers to share their findings and engage in a broader conversation about the significance of these topics. We hope to see you there!
noon
Click to Download PDF of Poster
The Limits and Possibilities of Cross-border Latinidades & Indigeneities April 24 / 12pm-5pm / Ford Lecture Hall, JSMA
The Limits and Possibilities of Cross-border Latinidades & Indigeneities symposium will bring together interdisciplinary Latinx and Indigenous scholars and researchers studying settler colonialism, transnational Indigeneities, and race through archival and ethnographic approaches. The conference will explore the boundaries between Indigeneity and Latinidad, both historically and in the present. It examines shifting borders and interactions of Indigenous and Latine people and diasporas, focusing on regions that are now California, Texas, Oregon, Mexico, and Central America.
12pm-1pm: Conference Opening and Keynote Presenters: María Josefina Saldaña-Portillo (New York University); Moderated by Chris Chavez (SOJC, University of Oregon); Special remarks by Jason Younker, Assistant Vice President, Advisor to the President on Sovereignty and Government-to-Government Relations, Chief, Coquille Tribe
1pm-2pm: Pre-1848 Mexican Borderlands: Californio Ranchero Culture and Indigenous California Presenters: Yvette Saavedra (Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, University of Oregon) and Naomi Sussman (History, University of Oregon); Moderated by Laura Pulido (Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies, University of Oregon)
2pm-3pm: Media, History and Citizenship of Indigenous and Latinx Peoples: Contested Lands and Identities across the Borderlands Presenters: Ramón Resendiz (Indiana University, UO Anthropology) and Rachel Nez (Navajo Diné Nation, Fort Lewis College); Moderated by Gabe Sanchez (Anthropology, University of Oregon)
3pm-4pm: Building Comunidad and Transborder Territories in Indigenous Diasporas From Mexico and Guatemala Presenters: Daina Sanchez (UC Santa Barbara) and Lynn Stephen (Anthropology, University of Oregon); Moderated by Jason Younker (University of Oregon)
4pm-5pm: Closing Remarks and Conversation Closing remarks from Miguel Gualdrón Ramírez (Philosophy, University of Oregon) and María Josefina Saldaña-Portillo (New York University)
5pm-6pm: Post-conference Reception Mingle with presenters and enjoy complimentary food and refreshments. All are welcome!
Questions? Email cllas@uoregon.edu
noon
The Department of Indigenous, Race, and Ethnic Studies welcomes Kit Myers, Assistant Professor of Critical Race and Ethnic Studies at UC Merced, for a talk on “The Violence of Love: Race, Adoption, and Family in the United States.”
12:00 pm on Friday, April 25 in EMU Crater Lake North (Room 146) Free and Open to the Public
The Violence of Love challenges the narrative that adoption is a solely loving act that benefits birth parents, adopted individuals, and adoptive parents–a narrative that is especially pervasive with transracial and transnational adoptions. Using interdisciplinary methods of archival, legal, and discursive analysis, Kit W. Myers comparatively examines the adoption of Asian, Black, and Native American children by White families in the United States. He shows how race has been constructed relationally to mark certain homes, families, and nations as spaces of love, freedom, and better futures–in contrast to others that are not–and argues that violence is attached to adoption in complex ways. Propelled by different types of love, such adoptions attempt to transgress biological, racial, cultural, and national borders established by traditional family ideals. Yet they are also linked to structural, symbolic, and traumatic forms of violence. The Violence of Love confronts this discomforting reality and rethinks theories of family to offer more capacious understandings of love, kinship, and care.
Cosponsored by the Mellon Foundation.
Kit Myers is transracial and transnational adoptee from Hong Kong and grew up in Oregon. He is currently an assistant professor in the Department of History & Critical Race and Ethnic Studies. He received his Ph.D. and M.A. from the University of California, San Diego in ethnic studies and his B.S. in ethnic studies and journalism from the University of Oregon. His book, The Violence of Love: Race, Family, and Adoption in the United States, was recently published with the University of California Press (2025). Myers has published journal articles in Adoption Quarterly, Critical Discourse Studies, Adoption & Culture, and Amerasia. He has also written on issues of race and policing. He serves on the executive committee for the Alliance for the Study of Adoption and Culture and previously served on the leadership team of the Adoption Museum Project. When Myers is not working, he loves spending time with his partner and two kids, being in nature, watching sports, coaching his daughters' soccer teams, and visiting family in Oregon.
4:00–5:30 p.m.
Roots and Rhythms: A Conversation on Afrodescendencia, Indigenous Heritage, and Community Empowerment in Mexico and Puerto Rico
April 29 / 4PM-5:30PM / Lawrence 115
Join us for a research colloquium as we delve into the intersections of Afrodescendencia, Indigenous heritage, and community empowerment in Mexico and Puerto Rico.
Alai Reyes-Santos (Professor of Practice, UO School of Law) and Abigayle Mitchell (Grad Student, UO School of Law) will present their research on La Piedra del Sapo, a significant Indigenous site in Puerto Rico. They'll explore how this site can facilitate meaningful engagement with the past and shape sustainable futures for the people of Cidra and the Puerto Rican diaspora.
Abraham Landa (Grad Student, Ethnomusicology) will share his research project, "Black Mexico: Music, Dance, and the Construction of Afrodescendencia in Costa Chica." This project examines the performance of African music and dance in Costa Chica, Mexico, and how Afro-Mexican communities use cultural expressions to claim historical presence and cultural recognition.
This event provides a platform for CLLAS-funded researchers to share their findings and engage in a broader conversation about the significance of these topics. We hope to see you there!
noon
Preserving Latinx Stories: A Conversation with NPR's VP of Research, Archives, and Strategy Laura Soto-Barra
April 30 / 12pm-1pm / Zoom
Join us for a virtual conversation with Laura Soto-Barra, NPR's Vice President of Research, Archives, and Strategy. Learn about NPR's archival work, the significance of preserving Latinx stories from the 1980s, and efforts to digitize and preserve Latinx voices. Moderated by Chris Chávez, CLLAS Director.
CLICK HERE TO JOIN VIA ZOOM