During the academic year, the University of Massachusetts campus is alive with interdepartmental events, and hosts a variety of distinguished lecturers. Now it is the Anthropology Department’s turn to sponsor a lecture as they invite Professor Jesus de Miguel to speak in Memorial Hall.
Professor de Miguel is Chair of the Department of Sociology at the University of Barcelona, and will give a lecture entitled “Identity, Democracy, and Disaffection: The Case of Spain” at 4 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 8. This is the sixth lecture in a series that the UMass Anthropology Department sponsors annually.
“I think [he will be speaking about] the change within Europe since the 1970s,” Dr. Oriol Pi-Sunyer, of the Department of Anthropology said. “Specifically for Spain since it was a dictatorship. Spain is now an active member of the European Union and recognizes democracy. I have an idea he will talk about internal changes and the role of Spain in the European Union and in Western Europe.”
In addition to his position on the University of Barcelona faculty, de Miguel also serves as the Vice-Chair for Social Sciences in the European Cooperation in the Field of Scientific and Technical Research as part of the European Commission in Brussels. His research currently focuses on Spanish social structure, social change, higher education, and the political system. He recently published a comparative study of higher education in Spain and the world entitled Excelencia. This latest work is one of 48 books he has authored.
Professor de Miguel has also been the recipient of grants from the Fulbright Commission, the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation and others during his career. He serves on the editorial board of Contemporary Sociology, and holds teaching positions at the University of Arizona, the University of Adelaide, and the University of California at Berkeley and San Diego. This fall has a teaching appointment at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.
The visit by Professor de Miguel serves to highlight the Department’s European research program. Both Anthropology faculty and graduate students have studied or will study in Europe through the program. Five Anthropology graduate students will travel throughout Europe to do research next spring under the direction of Dr. Pi-Sunyer. Some of the topics they will be studying include representations of tourism in Spain, and women in employment and immigration in Turkey.
“We’re trying to establish good connections not only with subjects of our study, but also those in Europe who do similar kind of work,” Pi-Sunyer said. “The logic is the same, and we want to know what they think about the issues in the field.”
According to Dr. Pi-Sunyer, the lecture falls within the cultural anthropology sphere of the department. He and his associates work specifically in Europe and Latin America. Pi-Sunyer is currently studying the impact of tourism on the Mayan people of Mexico as well as the politics and economics in Spain and other countries in the Mediterranean.
The exchange program also extends beyond simple lectures. Pi-Sunyer held a position as a visiting professor at the University of Barcelona and taught a class on multiculturalism.
“That [multiculturalism] is an issue of public concern in the US, but a relatively new issue in Spain,” Pi-Sunyer said. He also explained that the program is used as a model for exchange, and that is why de Miguel’s visit is so important to research enterprises. “We have many people who go and research there,” Pi-Sunyer said. “They [the people in Spain] live through it, they’ve experienced it, so it’s very important.”
The event is not just important for the UMass Anthropology Department. The Five College Lecture Fund, The Modern European Studies Program, the Center for Latin American, Caribbean and Latino Studies, the Departments of Anthropology and Sociology of Amherst College, Mt. Holyoke, and Hampshire College, and the Departments of Sociology at Smith College and UMass are all co-sponsors of de Miguel’s visit.
According to Pi-Sunyer all the Anthropology Departments from the five colleges get together once a year to relate on the topics that they are studying. “We talk about what we’re doing and what others are doing,” Pi-Sunyer said. “It’s a rather important thing and a way to keep in touch.”
Regardless of where the audience originates, Pi-Sunyer is confident that the lecture will appeal to many. He also encourages undergraduate students to attend in addition to the graduate students and faculty that are expected.
“An undergrad who’s interested in Anthropology will get a sense of how Anthropology subjects are dealt with on a professional level,” Pi-Sunyer said. “It puts them in a loop to see how these matters are treated on a more approachable level.”
