Giovanna Urdangarain

Education

• Ph.D., Indiana University, 2008
• M.A., Hispanic Literature, Indiana University, 2001
• B.A., Secondary Education Literature, Artigas Teacher Training Institute, Montevideo, Uruguay, 1991

Areas of Emphasis or Expertise

• Contemporary Latin American Narrative
• Southern Cone Dictatorial and Post-Dictatorial Narrative by Women Writers
• Memory and Trauma Studies

Research Projects

• Jewish Diaspora in Uruguay

  Since 2019, a team of PLU researchers–Dr. Rona Kaufman, Dr. Giovanna Urdangarain, and students Riley Dolan (2019), Kiyomi Kishaba (2021), Ellie Dieringer (2023), and Parker Brocker-Knapp (2023)–have been collecting, recording, translating, and sharing the testimonies of Uruguayan Jews who have experienced the Holocaust, migration, and the diaspora.
  To learn more about the project and experience, please visit the project website.

Selected Presentations

• 10th Annual Memory Studies Association Conference: Memory and Democracy. Panel Huellas de la dictadura: autobiografía, arte y transmisión de la memoria, Memoria(s) y sabere(s): lenguaje, cuerpo y la narración de lo atroz, Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires, Argentina (July 28-August 1, 2026)
• IV Simposio LASA (Latin American Studies Association) Cono Sur: Nuevos giros ideológicos, socioeconómicos y culturales. Desafíos políticos y aproximaciones emancipatorias desde el Cono Sur, Memoria(s) y sabere(s): lenguaje, cuerpo y la narración de lo atroz, Universidad Diego Portales, Santiago, Chile (July 13-16, 2026)
• 17 th Annual Powell-Heller Conference for Holocaust Education: Latin America and the Holocaust, Creating an Archive: Women as Holocaust Survivors in Uruguay, Panel “Interviewing Holocaust Survivors in Uruguay” in collaboration with PLU colleague Dr. Rona Kaufman and PLU alumnus Parker Brocker-Knapp, Pacific Lutheran University, Tacoma WA (November 5-7, 2025)
• LASA (Latin American Studies Association) Hybrid Congress 2025: Poner el cuerpo en Latinx América, América, From Painting to The Screen: Uruguayan Voices of Second Generation and The Construction of Their Archive, Track Human Rights and Memory, Virtual and on-site in San Francisco, CA (May 23-26, 2025)
• Race, Racialization, and Resistance: Curriculum, Pedagogy, and Humanities Conference, Undocumented Immigrants and The Politics of (Their) Representation, Seattle University, Seattle WA (April 25-27, 2025)
• LASA (Latin American Studies Association) Hybrid Congress 2024: Reaction and Resistance: Imagining Possible Futures in the Americas, Uruguayan Dictatorship and An Unfinished Educational Experiment: The “Special Groups,” Session “Discourses and Counter-discourses in Authoritarian Southern Cone Contexts: Indoctrination, Protest and Imagining under Dictatorship”, Virtual and on site in Bogotá, Colombia (May 12-15, 2024)
• XXXII Congress of Association of Gender and Sexualities Studies (AGSS): Intersections, Cancer, Language and (Re)construction, Panel - Gender, Body and Territory, School of Philosophy, Autonomous University of Querétaro, Querétaro, Mexico (October 5-7, 2023)
• LASA (Latin American Studies Association) Hybrid Congress 2023, América Latina y el Caribe: Pensar, representar y luchar por los derechos “Ópera prima (2018, Uruguay): La reformulación de la lucha por los derechos humanos", Session “Representaciones de la memoria, posmemoria y desmemoria: nuevas tendencias en la literatura y el cine conosurista y Latinx” Track Human Rights and Memory, Virtual and on-site in Vancouver, BC, Canada (May 24–27, 2023)
• 10th WANG CENTER SYMPOSIUM, Healing: Pathways for Restoration and Renewal, Southern Cone, State Terrorism and the Question of Healing/Cono Sur, Terrorismo de Estado y el tema de la sanación - Recording Made Available by The Wang Center, Pacific Lutheran University, Tacoma WA (March 9-10, 2022)
• XXX Congress of the Association of Gender and Sexuality Studies (AGSS), Creating an Archive: Women as Holocaust Survivors in Uruguay, Santo Domingo, República Dominicana (November 17-19, 2021)
• LASA Congress 2021, Refugees and Uruguayan Documentary Filmmaking: Other Upcoming Memories, Virtual Conference (May 26-29, 2021)
• XXXVI Internacional Congress of Literature and Hispanic Studies (CILH, Special Virtual Edition), “Quarantine Behaviors” or the Limits of Theater, CILH, Special Virtual Edition (June 17-19, 2020)
• III International Conference of Literature and Human Rights: Gender and Culture, co-organized by Universidad de Santiago de Chile and Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile in collaboration with University of Valparaíso (Chile), Università degli Studi di Milano and Brooklyn College of City University of New York, Santiago, Uruguay: Trans Identities, Representations and Liminality, co-organized by Universidad de Santiago de Chile, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, University of Valparaíso (Chile), Università degli Studi di Milano and Brooklyn College of City University of New York, Santiago, Chile (November 14-16, 2019)
• Cine-Lit 9: Mujer y Género, “Migas de pan” de Manane Rodríguez (Uruguay, 2016): memoria, mujeres y barbarie, co-organized by The University of Oregon, Portland State University, and Oregon State University Portland, OR (March 9-11, 2019)

Selected Articles

• Contributing Editor . "Literature: 21st Century Prose Fiction: Uruguay and Paraguay sections.." Handbook of Latin American Studies (HLAS) Vol. 78, 2024:
• Contributing Editor . "Literature: 21st Century Prose Fiction: Uruguay and Paraguay sections.." Handbook of Latin American Studies (HLAS) Vol. 76, 2023:
• Review. "Gabriela Polit Dueñas’ Unwanted Witnesses. Journalists & Conflict in Contemporary Latin America.." Revista de Estudios de Género y Sexualidades/Journal of Gender and Sexuality Studies Vol. 47, Fall 2021: 203-205.
• Contributing Editor . "Literature: 21st Century Prose Fiction: Uruguay and Paraguay sections.." Handbook of Latin American Studies (HLAS) Vol. 74, 2020: 491-492, 501-506.
• Contributing Editor . "Literature: 21st Century Prose Fiction: Uruguay and Paraguay sections.." Handbook of Latin American Studies (HLAS) Vol. 72, 2018: 472-473,484-487.
• "El cuerpo como bisemia: una mirada de género al pasado uruguayo reciente.” Poner el cuerpo:rescatar y visibilizar las marcas sexuales y de género de los archivos dictatoriales del Cono Sur. Ksenija Bilbija, Ana Forcinito, M. B. Llanos." Santiago de Chile: Editorial Cuarto Propio 2017: 171-186.
• "Los círculos de la memoria: el caso del uruguayo Henry Engler." Special Issue of Revista Iberoamericana entitled En la lente: memoria, referencialidad histórica y documentalismo en el cine latinoamericano actual. Vol. 81.251, 2015: 435-448.
• "Ética y lectura. La representación de la violencia en Los nudos del silencio de Renée Ferrer." A Contracorriente Vol. 12.2, Winter 2015: 349-376.
• "La memoria del cuerpo, el cuerpo de la memoria: Un secreto para Julia de Patricia Sagastizábal." Letras Femeninas Vol. 40.2, 2014: 79-93.
• "Víctima y representación en dos documentales uruguayos post-dictatoriales.” Efectos de imagen ¿Qué fue y qué es el cine militante? Ansa-Goicoechea, Elixabete, and Oscar Ariel Cabezas, eds. Santiago de Chile: Universidad Metropolitana de Ciencias de la Educación." University Press and LOM Ediciones 2014:
• "Rosario Ferré Versus Rosario Ferré: el prefacio como centro de disputa." Ciberletras 32 July 2014:

Accolades

• Wang Center Student-Faculty Research Grant, Wang Center for Global and Community Engaged Education, Pacific Lutheran University, for the project “Jewish Uruguayan Memories at the Crossroads of Childhood and Old Age” conducted with student Riley Dolan in Montevideo, Uruguay (Jan. 2019)
• Division of Humanities Special Recognition, Pacific Lutheran University, “for work with and for undocumented students at PLU, advocacy for an inclusive and welcoming university, and the many ways her teaching, scholarship and community engagement honor PLU’s mission and advance the ideals of humanistic inquiry”, 2017
• Faculty Honoree at the Acknowledgement of 2017 Inspirational Women, PLU Center for Gender Equity, Pacific Lutheran University
• Karen Hille Phillips Regency Advancement Award, Pacific Lutheran University, for the project entitled “Museums of Memory and Memory on Screen”, 2016
• Wang Center Faculty Research Grant, Pacific Lutheran University, 2014
• Spirit of Diversity Award awarded by Pacific Lutheran University Diversity Center, 2014
• Inspirational Women Recognition awarded by Pacific Lutheran University Women’s Center based on student’s nomination, 2013
• Innovative Teaching Grant [shared] awarded by the Provost’s Office, Pacific Lutheran University, for the project entitled “Reflections on Social Reconciliation Processes: Hispanic Countries vis á vis Post-Apartheid South Africa,” Spring Semester, 2011
• Karen Hille Phillips Regency Advancement Award Recipient, Pacific Lutheran University 2010-2011