Afro-Latin American and Caribbean Studies

The Specialization and International Course in Afro-Latin American and Caribbean Studies is an intensive postgraduate training program that aims to disseminate current research and debates on the history, trajectories, and social dynamics of the Afro-descendant population of Latin America and the Caribbean from critical decolonial, Afro-Latin American, Afro-Caribbean, and Afro-feminist perspectives. It also provides a space for intertwining academic, political, educational, and aesthetic reflections and fostering the creation and strengthening of this field of study.

In Latin America and the Caribbean, coloniality is a constitutive and specific element of a power structure in which the imposition of an ethno-racial classification on its population played a key role. Becoming aware of this coloniality of power, which operates in macro-social, micro-social, and subjective spheres, requires addressing the epistemologies of Afro-America and the racial question as a colonial historical invention whose effects continue to influence the social destiny and daily lives of those who inhabit this region. In turn, recognizing power as a web of relationships that inextricably intertwines at least three systems of oppression—race, gender, and class—and the various matrices that shaped the “historical alterities” derived from racialization in each nation, implies offering a new perspective on these relationships and promoting more effective actions, based on the specificities of Afro-Latin American and Caribbean thought and creativity. Finally, it involves understanding and confronting the processes of discrimination, exclusion, criminalization, genocide, femicide, and juvenicide of Afro-descendant populations and participating in the creation of conditions for the production of their own knowledge about these processes, and of appropriate strategies to fight against these forms of violence.

In the last decade, we have witnessed in the region what could be called an anti-racist turn, to describe this shift in how racism is addressed in the public sphere, and its effects, from the perspective of local anti-racist work. At the same time, in the last two years, the processes of oppression and racist violence that constitute coloniality have become more evident—as expressed la The disproportionate ethnic and racial distribution of COVID-19 victims, and the global movement of protests and awareness-raising against racism sparked by police violence and the deaths of George Floyd in Minneapolis and other young people of color in various countries of the region. In many contexts, this movement has also driven—with varying levels, intensity, scope, and results—the development and implementation of public policies to combat racism.

This training program aims to account for growth in the academic field and political of the intellectual and political organization of Black Latin Americans and Caribbeans and of an Afro-oriented theoretical and intellectual production that is investigating and confronting racism in its multiple dimensions and levels, from a critical and emancipatory perspective.

• To publicize and promote research on theories, histories, philosophies, knowledge, arts and cosmologies of African heritage in the Latin American and Caribbean continent.
• To provide conceptual and historical elements that allow for critical and intersectional approaches to addressing the racialization processes of Afro-descendant populations and their effects on social and daily life.
• Promote intersectional and situated analyses that allow understanding of the complexity of the existence of Afro-descendant women, men and LGBTIQ people and encourage the recognition of their rights.
• To train and empower for the design, monitoring and evaluation of actions and policies aimed at guaranteeing the human rights of Afro-descendant populations in the face of criminalization, genocide, femicide and black youth murder.
• Analyze the international conventions, agreements and resolutions that recognize and protect the rights of Afro populations within the framework of the Decade for People of African Descent.

The Specialization and the International Course are aimed at university graduates; postgraduate students; teachers; activists and members of trade unions, social movements and political parties; public officials; press workers; members and managers of non-governmental organizations and interested professionals in the study and implementation of care policies in Latin America and the Caribbean.

A university degree/undergraduate degree or equivalent is required.

La Specialization in Afro-Latin American and Caribbean Studies It will last 12 months and requires the following for accreditation: 

• An intensive seminar
• An international course
• Two elective virtual seminars from the curriculum
• A writing support workshop
• The preparation of a final integrative project

The Specialization accredits 360 hours/teacher of work and is certified by CLACSO and FLACSO Brazil. 

El International Course It can be taken independently without enrolling in the Specialization program. For students admitted in the second intake, the course will run between February and December 2023. The following is required for accreditation: 

• The realization and approval of an intensive seminar corresponding to the first 5 classes of the international course. 
• Once the intensive seminar is completed, the students will be enrolled in the international course and will attend the following 7 classes.

The International Course is accredited with 90 lecture hours and is certified by CLACSO and FLACSO Brazil.

Students will have the support of academic tutors who will accompany them through the different curricular areas and guide them in the completion of final projects.

CLARIFICATION: Those who enroll in the complete Specialization should not enroll in the International Course separately.

Course materials will be offered in both Spanish and Portuguese. Similarly, the course bibliography may be provided in either of the two official languages. Student contributions to discussion forums may also be in these languages. The final research paper may be written in either Spanish or Portuguese.

The certification of the Specialization and the International Course will be carried out by the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (Flacso Brazil) and by the Latin American Council of Social Sciences (CLACSO).