Today, Sep. 8, Ana Flores, Executive Director of the Mexican Cultural Center of Philadelphia, will visit the Falvey Memorial Library to give a presentation titled “Building Bridges: Cultural Activities that Bring Communities Together.” Flores (photo below) will be discussing Mexico and the Mexican Community in the Greater Philadelphia area.

You can see her profile on the Latino Film Festival website. Her true role in the community, however, shines through in news articles published in the last couple of years concerning her work and contributions, including articles in:
Temple University’s Philadelphia Neighborhoods
Al Día News
Philly Voice
On the U.S. Embassies & Consulates in Mexico website.

For those of you interested in catching up on contemporary discourse in Latin American studies, the library maintains a number of resources that cover a wide array of Mexican and Latin American cultural movements. Look into the CIAO Database, which aggregates content regarding international affairs, or you can always search the PAIS, or Public Affairs International Service database, to find out contemporary geopolitical issues concerning Mexico and other Latin American nations. Some of this information may be particularly suited for discussing Ana’s work with the Mexican Consulate.

The Falvey Memorial Library also provides access to journals in the areas of Hispanic cultural studies and Hispanic research. These journals include The Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies, The Hispanic Research Journal, and The Bulletin of Hispanic Studies.

Academic sources can sometimes prove challenging to read, especially if the source comes from outside of one’s area of study. For journalistic pieces on Mexico and Latin America, it is also worthwhile to use the ProQuest Newsstand.

Do not be put off by Hispanic/Mexican studies due to your own monolingualism; most of the sources here have articles in both English and Spanish. These resources were brought to my attention by resource librarians Sue Ottignon and Merrill Stein, and I would encourage anyone looking for more information to reach out to them for their expertise as well.

Flores’ visit to the library is part of Hispanic Heritage Month, an important part of your Villanova experience, brought to you by the Romance Languages Department and the Latin American Studies Program.

 Article by William Repetto, a graduate assistant on the Communications and Marketing Team at the Falvey Memorial Library. He is currently pursuing an MA in English at Villanova University.