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Andean Studies Program

FIU faculty and students possess a keen interest in the history, culture and contemporary issues of the Andean region. Indeed, few universities in the United States rival the depth of expertise on the Andes found at FIU. Faculty expertise spans disciplines, ranging from politics to biological sciences to history to law to public health and medicine. An outgrowth of LACC's Colombian Studies Institute and a relatively newly-designated Program of Excellence, Andean Studies aims to develop and facilitate cutting-edge research on the region and build lasting partnerships that extend from Miami to Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Venezuela and Bolivia, and into Chile and Argentina.

In addition to promoting scholarly productivity and encouraging active academic exchange between FIU faculty and students and partners in Andean countries, the Program is also designed to leverage our strategic location in Miami and promote activities that serve the local community both inside and outside of FIU. The mission of Andean Studies is to support faculty and graduate student working groups, as well as broad reaching university-wide programming to further enrich community awareness and deepen people's understanding of the arts, culture, politics and societies of the Andes.

More specifically, the LACC Andean Studies Program includes but is not limited to the following:

Andean Studies Steering Committee: Comprised of core faculty from various departments and one graduate student representative, the Steering Committee is responsible for strategic planning. Members serve in an advisory capacity to define, evaluate and expand the Program’s activities while ensuring programming coherence, impact and sustainability.

The Fifth Corner Working Group: This interdisciplinary working group comprised of over two dozen faculty meets once a semester in an effort to make Miami part of “the Andes” broadly defined and strengthen the ties that already connect FIU to the region. It provides a forum for sharing depth of faculty expertise and serves to create synergies across disciplines. Meetings are often thematically tied to Andean Studies events and are intended to support an ongoing dialogue on and in the region. Faculty and advanced graduate students with research interests or even more general interests in the Andean region are invited to participate and contribute to enhanced knowledge of Andean history, culture, politics and peoples in the Fifth Corner.

Outreach and Events: Andean Studies is proud to sponsor a wide range of events that highlight unique research and teaching on the region and provide high-quality multi- or inter-disciplinary learning opportunities to the university community as well as members of the media, business and government sectors, and general public. Building on LACC's strong linkages and the breadth of FIU faculty networks throughout the Andean region, the Andean Studies Program of Excellence sponsors an exciting outreach program that features leading scholars, prominent policy experts, and important community leaders for events on and off-campus. Former presidents, labor union activists, musicians, anthropologists and human rights lawyers have shared their perspectives and work and the program welcomes lively discussion, active engagement, and scholarly debate at Andean Studies hosted events.

Andean Studies Hub: Andean Studies is particularly proud to promote existing partnerships between FIU and Andean institutions, such as environmental studies exchanges and collaborative research around the Andean Amazon and prioritizes the establishment of new institutional collaboration to support faculty exchange, joint research projects and outreach events, and international learning opportunities for students interested in the region. Andean Studies also serves as an institutional hub for a variety of Andes-related activities at FIU, including undergraduate student projects, including those that focus on the FIU Frost Art Museum's important pre-Colombian artifact collection, as well as those identifying and facilitating access to research sources on Andean history and culture.