Celebrating the Hispanic Studies Community

A warm April afternoon and an inviting room at the Cohen Career Center ornamented by faculty and students were the perfect scenario for an eagerly anticipated celebration of the community forged by Hispanic Studies students, faculty, alums, and enthusiasts. The intellectual and affective community that the Hispanic Studies program at large nurtures every day was able to share some time, food, good conversation, and laughs as students talked about their experiences in our program, met other students, and even mapped future trajectories! Faculty were able to reconnect with former students, and meet future students; W&M alums such as Allison Corbett (’09), currently working on an oral history project called The Language of Justice/El lenguaje de la justicia, were able to share their thoughts and their excitement about HISP; and Sean Schofield, Assistant Director at the Cohen Career Center, joined us to share his insights and to remind everyone that the kind of intercultural communication and competency in which HISP students are trained are key skills for every global citizen in today’s world.

Thanks to the effort of Profs. John Riofrio, Paulina Carrión, Christina Baker, Mariana Melo-Vega, and Carmen Sanchis-Sinisterra, over sixty people had the opportunity to celebrate being part of our Hispanic Studies community, and to take turns trying to hit a most elusive piñata!