El objeto de estudio de este trabajo de investigación es la visión de la educación del autor cubano José Martí presente en los escritos de los últimos años de su vida, efectivamente de 1882 a su muerte en 1895. El punto de partida del estudio es la afirmación del crítico uruguayo Ángel Rama (1926-1983) de que la preocupación principal de Martí durante esa época era la incorporación de la modernidad en América Latina. La hipótesis que se intenta probar en este trabajo es que esa mirada hacia la modernidad asume inflexiones particulares aplicadas a la visión educativa del autor. Para una adecuada consideración de tal hipótesis, el trabajo se divide en tres partes. En la primera, se plantean los desafíos, metas y paradojas de la modernidad latinoamericana. En la segunda, se analiza la visión de la educación presentada en los artículos de la prensa de Martí durante dicho período. Y en la última parte, se considera la visión de la educación y de la infancia presentada en La Edad de Oro, la revista infantil que Martí escribió entre julio y octubre de 1889. El objetivo final de esta tesis es detallar la manera en que la preocupación de Martí por la incorporación de la modernidad en América Latina se manifiesta en sus ideas sobre la educación y se extiende también hacia su visión de la historia y de la naturaleza.

The object of the survey about to be described, was to establish the value of the artificial language test as a prognostic basis for language aptitude. Could the artificial language test be a reliable guide for determining a student's linguistic ability? Teachers have long needed something to give them an index to pupil's capabilities so as to meet better their needs in the class room. Counselors have wanted such tests to aid them in directing young people into channels of endeavor where they can best achieve success

Latin America holds a diverse array of people and language. Even regions and countries that speak the same language tend to speak it differently. This leads to interesting variations in language and speech. Most people of Latin American origin are able to note that Mexican Spanish and Puerto Rican Spanish are different in terms of intonation, speech pattern, vocabulary, and more. Most popular theories that section Latin America off by dialects group the entirety of the Spanish-speaking Caribbean into a single dialectical community. Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic each hold unique histories and are home to a fascinating array of different cultures and people. Using previously conducted linguistic investigations and research, the goal of this thesis is to make a case which acknowledges the linguistic diversity that exists in the Hispanic Caribbean which will be further supported by theories of sociolinguistics and the historical linguistic model.

This dissertation focuses on dominant contemporary depictions of women in order to investigate the related processes of producing and policing physical attractiveness and privilege in mainstream cultural productions. I examine how certain US Latina, Colombian, and Dominican female portrayals fit definite paradigms of ideal beauty and contribute to patterns of power within magazines, films and television, music, and literary novels. I explore the ways in which the majority of dominant representations in all three countries favor specific beauty ideals linked with an Anglo or Northern European archetype, thus limiting the acceptable model and excluding a great part of the racially mixed female population which fails to match this criterion. By studying the relationship between body image and messages that inspire anxiety for those women who fall outside of ideal beauty patterns, my analysis bridges sociological and anthropological studies within literary theories and visual culture and contributes to new perspectives on Latinidad and Tropicalism by including a trans-nationalistic approach. While much work has been done on the connection between the body and identity within the United States, scholarship within this area has been more limited within Hispanic literature and Latin American popular culture in terms of the role of power structures. While one perception of beauty is that it is merely physical, in reality racial classification and the recognition of “legitimate” beauty have tangible impacts on social matters such as access to employment, marriageability, perceptions of education, civilization, decency, and purity.

This thesis is an analytical case study of three music videos, "Pa'l Norte" by Calle 13, "Sueño Americano" by Los Rakas, and "Ice El Hielo" by La Santa Cecilia. It explores the visual and lyric narratives of these works and their role in critiquing anti-immigration rhetoric towards Latino immigrants in the United States in a post-9/11 context. Through critical analysis, this thesis argues that their work is vital in dismantling the dehumanizing and criminalizing language prevalent in legal and popular discourse, as well as challenging the manifestations of everyday "illegality."

This dissertation explores the relationship between language, sacramentality, and enchantment in three twentieth-century Argentine poets: Francisco Luis Bernárdez (1900-1976), Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986), and Alejandra Pizarnik (1936-1972). It seeks to ask and answer two fundamental questions. First, to what extent might it be possible to understand the conception of poetic language characteristic of modern poetry as an articulation, however muffled and secularized, of a sacramental apprehension of language and world? Second, how might such a conception be related to what Max Weber famously called “the disenchantment of the world”? The dissertation begins with a broad overview of the development of the concept of disenchant within Western culture and then proceeds to a reading of the three poets mentioned above. Special attention is given throughout both to historical and political context and to the specific ways in which Bernárdez, Borges, and Pizarnik understand and employ poetic language. In each case, I attempt to show how, among both secular and religious poets, language retains vestiges of a sacramental understanding of the world.

The Spanish expression haciendo memoria is almost always translated as "remembering." I chose the literal translation "making memory" because it more adequately describes the task of mourning that takes place when dealing with trauma. Psychology tells us that when a traumatic event occurs, only a non-narrative imprint of an event is recorded--seared--in the mind, and the narrative form must be created. Only then can it be mentally manipulated and even communicated and --in both a literal and literary sense-- made history. The trauma explored in this study is centered on the dirty war in Argentina of the 1970’s and 1980’s. This period is usually framed as the excessively brutal and violent extermination of armed rebels by the last Argentine military dictatorship (March 1976-December 1983). But this emplotment of history does not adequately explain the origins or the severity of the violence. In part, it is this narrative deficit which keeps the trauma fresh in the Argentine collective consciousness. There is an overwhelming wealth of information about this period; yet the traditional models for framing history do not seem to suit the data nor do they fully capture the ethos. They are like loose characters and events searching for a story in which to belong or a narrative to call home. Part of the mourning process is the creation of emplotments and narrative structures which can make sense –make memory—of the dirty war. This dissertation focuses on the early narrative of Martín Caparrόs, one of the narrative voices ‘making memory’ of this time period. In my dissertation I will explore his first three novels against the backdrop of Michael Rothberg’s study “Traumatic Realism”, which identifies three dimensions of the representation of traumatic history: a demand for documentation, a demand for reflection on the limits of representation, and a demand for engagement with the public sphere. I will disentangle Caparrόs’ complex narrative techniques in order to uncover his early struggle with these three demands, as he attempts to create his own constellation of meaning.

This thesis, written in the Spanish language, merges historical documents, literature, and interviews in the form of a creative story that explores the Puerto Rican identity through the lens of one family. Cuca, the main character, is an allegory of the island’s current and historical state of “in-betweenness”. As a former Spanish colony, then U.S. territory, and now a U.S. commonwealth, the island has incorporated elements from each imperial regime, though never fully being a part of any. The story begins in 2008 and centers first on Cuca, and then her granddaughter who struggles to understand her own identity as both an American and a Puerto Rican. The story then goes back in time to 1930, the year in which the Puerto Rican government legalized divorce. After Cuca’s mother divorces her Spanish father, and then marries an American, Cuca comes to have two paternal figures much like Puerto Rican has had: one Spanish and one American. Taking place between 1930 and 1942, the story focuses on the island’s evolving identity between the Great Depression years and the beginning of Operation Bootstrap, the latter which sought to modernize the island and to increase tourism. The thesis raises the complexities of being Puerto Rican, but also more generally the complexities of all those who feel caught between cultures and identities.

Reducing diabetes risk among Hispanic-American adults in the United States is a critical public health need and programs targeting young Hispanic-American adults with prediabetes can reduce the risk for developing diabetes. The purpose of this project was twofold: (a) to examine the literature related to diabetes prevention best practices among young adult Hispanic-Americans with prediabetes and (b) create an intervention program to promote these best practices to delay or reverse the trajectory toward diabetes. The inclusion criteria for the literature review were studies with at least a 12-month follow-up and reported outcomes related to changes in diet, increased exercise, and the effects of psychotherapy as modeled in the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP). Studies that met these inclusion criteria for the period 2002 through January 2016 were evaluated and 11 studies supported the development of recommendations for future implementation. Pender's health promotion model provided useful theoretical support for the effectiveness of individual health behavior changes to reduce the risk of developing diabetes. Based on the literature review, proposed interventions included dietary interventions, behavior modifications, and both aerobic and resistance exercise training adapted for the young adult Hispanic-American population. The planned interventions will fill an evidence-to-practice gap in application of the DPP. The program when implemented will promote social change through lifestyle modifications among young adult Hispanic-Americans with prediabetes and is expected to improve dietary intake, weekly exercise, fasting glucose, and glucose tolerance and support weight loss, all of which can delay or stop progression to diabetes.

The ideas of Mexican Machismo have been crystallized in the image of the Macho, a virile man who represents the ideals of masculinity in a determined time and space. This work aims to examine how four Mexican Novels (Juan Rulfo’s Pedro Páramo, Elena Garro’s Los Recuerdos del Porvenir, Yuri Herrera’s Trabajos del Reino, and Fernanda Melchor’s Temporada de huracanes) present their unique macho ideals, and how the male characters fail to fulfill them. Through a textual examination of the four novels, this work asks: how is a macho image formed in each pair of novels? And most importantly how do male characters react when they are unable to uphold the masculine values? Chapter one examines Juan Rulfo’s and Elena Garro’s novels, focusing on the downfall of the machos due to the loss of a loved woman, and the strategies the men use to control their towns. Chapter two analyzes Yuri Herrera’s and Fernanda Melchor’s novels, explaining how masculinity is tied to a social performance, and how the machos lose the approval of their group. Chapter three deals with the reaffirmation of power through isolation of female characters and the concept of emasculation as a social and psychological phenomenon. Emasculation, this work strives to prove, is a key element in the four novels, uniting the texts through the social disgrace of a man who does not perform as expected.