Humanities Lecture Series to sponsor talks on Africa, Latin America

York College’s Global Humanities Lecture Series will present two talks in March. “Africa In a Global Context,” presented by Johns Hopkins University anthropology professor Jane I. Guyer, will begin at 7 p.m., March 11. “Africa to Latin America: Globalization and Its Shared Effects,” a panel discussion featuring York faculty members, is scheduled for 3:30 p.m., March 16. Both events will be held in Room 218 of the Humanities Center and are open to the public free of charge.

Jane Guyer is a member of the International Advisory Group to the World Bank and the Governments of Chad and Cameroon on the Chad-Cameroon Petroleum Development. She is the author or editor of ten major research studies on family life, monetary policy, land use, and hunger in Africa; Guyer was elected as member of the National Academy of Science.

Guyer has served previously on the faculties of Northwestern, Harvard, and Boston University. Her research career has been developed to studying economic transformations in West Africa, particularly the productive economy, the division of labor, and the management of money. Theoretically she focuses on the interface between formal and informal economies, and particularly the instabilities that interface gives rise to.

The March 16 panel discussion will feature Professor of Political Science Kwasi Sarfo, Assistant Professor of Political Science Javier Aguayo, Assistant Professor of Geography David Fyfe, and Associate Professor of Spanish Gabriel Abudu.

Africa and Latin America share not only a colonial past, they also share a postcolonial present and, more than likely, a postcolonial future, at least in the short term. The common legacy of European imperialism and colonization has created a series of persistent and far-reaching problems in such areas as the environment, economic development, education, politics and cultural formation. The panel will discuss the similarities and differences in the ways in which Africa and Latin America experience and address the problems, as well as how globalization will help or hinder progress toward a shared sustainable future.