Lisa Crossman received her B.A. from Northern Arizona University and her M.A. in Art History at Tulane. She completed the joint Ph.D. in Art History and Latin American Studies in August, 2013. Lisa has traveled widely in Latin America and has conducted research in Argentina and Uruguay funded by the Tinker Foundation. Her research focus was on visual culture, cultural exchange, and the Southern Cone.

A native New Orleanian, Marcelle Beaulieu earned her B.A. in International Studies and Spanish from the University of Mississippi in 2004. During her undergraduate career, Marcelle studied at the Universidad Católica de Córdoba in Argentina. She has also traveled extensively throughout Mexico, particularly in the central and southern regions of the country. Marcelle received her M.A. degree from the Stone Center in 2007 after completing her thesis entitled ‘€œOperation Team America: U.S. Immigration Policy and the Emergence of the Minutemen.‘€ In 2008, as a member of a graduate student research team led by Professor Aaron Schneider and funded by the Stone Center, Marcelle traveled through Guatemala and Mexico following Central American and Mexican migratory routes to the United States. Alongside her interest in migration, Marcelle has also focused her research on the immigration and emigration policies of sender, recipient and transit countries in Latin America. She has presented her research at numerous regional conferences, including the 2009 meetings of both the Southeastern Council on Latin American Studies and the Southern Political Science Association held in New Orleans. At the Stone Center‘€™s 2009 Annual Spring Awards Ceremony, Marcelle received the award for the best campus-wide graduate paper on a Latin American topic for her paper, ‘€œFirst and Third World Borders: Shared Characteristics and Strategies.‘€ She has also worked in New Orleans as an ESL and Spanish teacher, a research intern at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington, DC, a New Orleans-based immigration law firm staff member, and a Senior Policy Analyst for Louisiana legislator Walt Leger.

M.A. Alumna 2006

A native of Jackson, Mississippi, Jennifer earned a B.A. in Latin American Studies, International Development, and Classical Studies from Tulane University, graduating summa cum laude and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa. She earned her M.A. in Latin American Studies from Tulane in May 2015. During her time as a Tulane undergraduate, Jennifer participated in Stone Center summer study abroad programs in both Chile and Cuba, exploring questions of economic development and literary culture. Jennifer's undergraduate research, which was presented at the UT Austin ILASSA annual conference (entitled 'Pots, Potatoes, and Progress for Women: Rethinking Feminism in Post-Crisis Latin America'), focused on the comedores populares of Peru and their impact on female empowerment. After graduation, Jennifer traveled to southern Chile as a teaching assistant for the 'English Opens Doors Program,' sponsored by the Chilean Ministry of Education and the United Nations Development Program. Jennifer spent her time in the M.A. program exploring the relationship between gender and various facets of development, including issues of food security and healthcare, in the Andean region.

Cydney Schwartz received her BA in American Studies from the University at Buffalo in 2011 and her M.A. in Latin American Studies from Tulane in May 2015. As an undergraduate, she studied African and Latin American literature, with an emphasis in critical theory. She also studied at Pontifícia Universidade Católica in Rio de Janeiro, and traveled most of the Southern cone. Her post-graduate years were spent as a traveling musician in Central America and Mexico, exploring different communities through their relationship with music. She later moved to Guatemala City where she produced a Latin-fusion CD with local musicians, and collaborated with numerous social art projects and student movements. During her time at the Stone Center, she studied identity politics and literature in Guatemala, with particular emphasis on indigenous literary production.

Originally from Atlanta, Georgia, Christina received her B.A. in Diplomacy and World Affairs from Occidental College in Los Angeles and her M.A. in Latin American Studies from Tulane in May 2015. Christina has proudly called New Orleans home, working in environmental non-profits and wetland restoration social entrepreneurship ventures and volunteering with educational and college-access nonprofits. During her undergraduate career, Christina studied in Ghana and worked in development aid at the United Nations in New York. Focusing on cocaine trafficking in West Africa, her undergraduate thesis analyzed issues of postcolonial development, nationality, statehood and criminality. At the Stone Center, Christina pursued her M.A. on issues of diaspora, transnationalism, race, identity and climate change in the Caribbean. She has also earned an additional M.A. (December 2016) and a Ph.D. (May 2022) in history at Tulane University.

Mira received her B.A. in Anthropology and Latin American Studies with a minor in Hispanic Studies from Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota in 2010, and her M.A. in Latin American Studies from Tulane in 2015. While an undergraduate, Mira conducted ethnographic field research in Cochabamba, Bolivia, which served as a basis for theses, 'Changing the Politics of Citizenship: Intercultural Education in Bolivia and Peru' and 'Teaching the Nation in and against the State: The Ambiguous Position of Bolivian Teachers in Education.' Mira spent a year teaching in a public school in southern Spain, and since then has managed the direct-service citizenship program of the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition.

Originally from New England, Mira has traveled and studied in countries throughout Latin America. At the Stone Center, Mira pursued her M.A. with research interests in the performance of identity, historiography, oral narratives, race and ethnicity, and collective remembering. Mira also earned an M.A. (May 2017) and a Ph.D. (May 2022) in history at Tulane University.

Hilary Marie Johnson, originally from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, earned her B.A. in Romance Languages and Literatures (Italian, Portuguese) at the University of Chicago and her M.A. in Latin American Studies from Tulane in May 2015. During her undergraduate career, Hilary lived in Pisa and Bologna, where she conducted research on identity and integration issues of immigrants in Italy through the study of Migration Literature. As a Mellon Mays fellow, Hilary had the opportunity to refine, present, and ultimately parlay her research findings into her B.A. thesis, entitled “Una nuova generazione, un nuovo impedimento: Identità spaccata attraverso i ‘nuovi’ scrittori-migranti.” Upon completing her undergraduate studies, Hilary was awarded a Fulbright grant, which allowed her to teach English in Pelotas, a city in southern Brazil close to the border with Uruguay. This was the second time Hilary lived in Brazil; prior to enrolling in college, Hilary was a Rotary Youth Exchange Student in the state of São Paulo. Hilary is a Brazilianist and her research during her time at the Stone Center focused on funk carioca, manifestation of culture in marginalized groups, and social inclusion discourse. Hilary was a Department of State Charles B. Rangel fellow and is currently with the U.S. Foreign Service as a Public Diplomacy officer.

Before coming to Tulane to pursue a Ph.D. in Latin American Studies, Gray Miles lived and worked as a freelance journalist in Mexico, Spain, Chile, and Colombia. Gray has traveled extensively in the Andean region of South America. He received a double honours B.A. from the University of King’s College in Halifax, Nova Scotia in Spanish and Contemporary Studies (philosophy). He was later awarded a Master’s degree in Journalism with a minor in Latin American Studies from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, B.C., where he successfully defended his thesis on the framing of Colombian news by U.S. correspondents working out of Bogota. Gray has produced several documentary film, the latest entitled “Cruel Courage,” the subject of which is Colombian terrorism and its impact on everyday life. Gray’s dissertation research project was on the Colombian conflict, human rights, and the possibilities for post-conflict Colombian society.

Elise Dietrich, a native of Hanover, New Hampshire, graduated in 2001 with a B.A. in Studio Art from Bard College and holds an M.A. (May 2009) in Latin American Studies from Tulane. Before joining the Stone Center in 2007, Elise worked in New England and spent a year as a research assistant at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. She studied abroad in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil as well as Venezuela and Oaxaca, Mexico. Elise conducted her master's research in both Minas Gerais and Rio de Janeiro with grants funded by the Stone Center and the Tinker Foundation. At Tulane, her research focused on visual culture, Brazilian popular culture and music, and identity construction. Elise's M.A. thesis was entitled 'A Turma do Pererã: Representations of Race and Gender in a Pre-Dictatorial Brazilian Children's Comic.' In 2009, she won the Stone Center's Donald Robertson Award for the Best Graduate Paper in the Humanities by a Latin American Studies Graduate Student. Elise defended her doctoral dissertation over the Summer of 2014 and earned her Ph.D. in Latin American Studies from Tulane in August 2014.

Cherif Saloum Diatta joined the Stone Center in 2009 as a Fulbright Student Fellow and earned his Ph.D. degree in May 2015. He is a native of Dakar, Senegal, and holds both a B.A. and an M.A. in English as well as a pre-doctoral diploma on Caribbean literature. His pre-doctoral thesis was entitled “Creoleness in Caribbean Literature: The Examples of Dereck Walcott’s Dream on Monkey Mountain and Patrick Chamoiseau’s Solibo Magnificient.” In November of 2007, he received a commendation from the Senegal Head of State for his distinguished scholarship at Cheikh Anta Diop Dakar University. He received his high school teacher training degree in 2008 and has taught at both the Djignabo High School of Ziguinchor and at the University of Ziguinchor in Senegal. Cherif’s research interests include Caribbean literature, African Diaspora studies, gender, creoleness, identity and post-colonialism. In 2013, Cherif received the Stone Center Summer Research Grant, and spent six weeks in Trinidad doing research for his dissertation on Earl Lovelace's literary work. He interviewed Lovelace himself and Prof. Funso Aiyejina, the authority on Lovelace. Cherif’s dissertation was entitled, 'Nation and Diaspora: Identity and Community Politics in the Fiction of Earl Lovelace.' From 2010 to 2013, Cherif presented research papers at several conferences: in Jamaica (the Second International Maroon Conference in Portland), at Tulane University (New Orleans), at the University of Indiana (Bloomington), and at the University of Wisconsin (Stevens Point). In September 27, 2013, Cherif received the NCCLA Student Research Award for his paper, 'Masks of Resistance: Mimicry and Cultural Survival in Earl Lovelace's The Wine of Astonishment” during the North Central Council for Latin Americanists (NCCLA) conference at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. In November 2, 2013, Cherif coordinated the Stone Center Summer Research Grant Symposium.