LASC 234
Issues in Latin American Studies I
Search and Citation Exercise

Using the core research resources in Latin American studies available through the University Libraries' LASC 234 Research Guide, you are to identity a short list of sources related to a chosen research topic.

The Guide is available online via the LASC 234 ELMS website.

The Guide can also be accessed directly at the URL is: http://lib.guides.umd.edu/lasc234.

The Assignment

  1. Select one of the five research topics attached. You may, alternatively, develop a research topic of your own interests.
  2. Using the links to the research resources indexed on the Guide, identify and properly cite EIGHT (8) relevant sources of the following types:

Citation styles should follow Chicago/Turabian Style Manual (Notes System) described in detail at: http://www.lib.umd.edu/guides/citing_chicnotes.html

The assignment is due at the beginning of class on Thursday, September 22, 2011.

The assignment represents 5% of your total grade for the course.

Questions may be directed to:

Daryle Williams
Patricia Herron

Research Topics Select one of the topics below and identify and properly cite the assigned number of relevant sources.

OR

Think of a research topic of your choice and identify and properly cite the assigned number of relevant sources. The topic should be relevant to Latin America and its study.

What was the Cochabamba Water War all about?

In 1999, the Bolivian government signed a $2.5 billion contract with Aguas del Tunari, a consortium of multinational engineering and construction firms led by the Bechtel Corporation. The agreement included a forty-year concession to manage water and sanitation services in the city of Cochabamba. In January 2000, an increase in water rates sparked widespread popular protests against Aguas del Tunari. The protests, some violent, quickly spread to La Paz. The Cochabamba "Water War" soon landed at the annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, held in Washington, DC. The contract with Aguas del Turani was subsequently revoked, representing (for some) a major victory for antiglobalization activism and contemporary indigenous political mobilization.

How would you characterize the significance of foreign immigration in the urban development of the River Plate republics?

Although River Plate culture is often defined around the appeal of local criollo culture, the demographic and social history of cities throughout the River Plate are deeply shaped by foreign immigration. The development of the region's two main cities — Buenos Aires and Montevideo — has been especially marked by foreigners, first by Spaniards and enslaved Africans, and later by migrants hailing from Spain and Italy as well as the Russian and Ottoman empires. By the 1920s, nearly one of every two residents of the Argentine capital was foreign-born. Immigrant flows continue to shape contemporary Buenos Aires, whose total population is about 4.25% foreign-born. Newer immigrant communities in the region include Bolivians, Paraguayans, and Peruvians, as well as East Asians, especially from Korea and China.

How has the human rights community responded to the epidemic of feminicidios in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico?

In the 1990s, various human rights organizations grew alarmed by a dramatic increase in violent homicides of working-class women, mainly maquiladoras [female assembly-plant workers], in the northern Mexican city of Ciudad Juárez. The majority of these murders, known in Spanish as feminicidios, remain unsolved. Between 1998 and 2005, a number of Mexican and international human rights organizations — the National Human Rights Commission of Mexico, the Organization of American States' Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and Amnesty International, among others — have investigated the high incidence of homicide and sexual violence against women in Ciudad Juárez. In their findings, these organizations have identified a wide range of deficiencies in local and federal policing as well as a prevailing culture of gender prejudice.

Why are some Afro-Brazilians concerned with proving descent from runaway slave communities?

The Brazilian Constitution of 1988 guaranteed territorial rights to citizens who could prove to be descendants of former runaway slave communities [Portuguese: quilombo; English: maroon communities]. Over the past twenty-five years, a state foundation dedicated to the promotion of the rights of black Brazilians, known as the Fundação Cultural Palmares, has certified the recognition of over 1300 communities located in all corners of the country. The claims to be a remanescente de quilombos has become important vehicle for winning land and cultural rights, especially among the Afro-Brazilian rural poor.

The Panama Canal is currently being expanded. Why?

In 2006, Panamanian voters gave the Panama Canal Authority [Spanish: Autoridad del Canal de Panamá, or ACP] the green light to expand the capacity of the most important navigational canal of the Americas. Once operational in 2014, a series of new locks and widened channels will accommodate the supertankers and container ships that currently exceed the maximum size (known as "Panamax") that the Canal can safely accommodate. With a projected doubling of Canal traffic, the Authority intends to recover construction costs associated with this expansion over a period 10 years. Panamanian politicians have claims that the expanded Canal will have a dramatic impact on the reduction of the poverty rate, with minimal adverse impacts on the environment.