From Northfield to the North Central Council of Latin Americanists
In this Faculty View reflection, Associate Professor of Spanish and O.C. and Patricia Boldt Endowed Chair/Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Humanities Kristina Medina-Vilariño reflects on her work connecting teaching, student research, community partnerships, and public scholarship through the humanities.
When St. Olaf College student and TRIO McNair Scholar Zareth Pérez ’28 presented her oral history research on Latinidad in southern Minnesota at the North Central Council of Latin Americanists conference, she connected research rooted in Northfield with broader scholarly conversations about Latinidad, migration, and belonging. Her participation illustrates the value of providing students with opportunities to develop their research and share it with wider academic audiences.
Pérez was the only St. Olaf student presenting, joining faculty members Américo Mendoza-Mori, assistant professor of romance languages; Mariana Reyes Payán, assistant professor of romance languages; León Narváez, professor of romance languages and Latin American studies; Nathan Norris, visiting assistant professor of history; and me. With research and travel funding provided by the TRIO McNair Scholars Program, her participation shows how undergraduate research grows through relationships among students, faculty, staff, community partners, and scholarly organizations.
The value of her project began with the local relationships that made it possible. Presenting at NCCLA offered another opportunity to share that work, hear other perspectives, and contribute to conversations about Latinidad, migration, and belonging.
As I reflect on the final year of my appointment as the O.C. and Patricia Boldt Endowed Chair in the Humanities, I am grateful for the support that has helped me connect teaching, student research, community engagement, and public scholarship. Boldt funding has supported initiatives that create opportunities for students and help bring humanities scholarship into conversation with communities beyond the classroom. This work also depends on the contributions of colleagues, staff, students, community partners, and the institutional resources that sustain these collaborations.
The Svoboda Center for Civic Engagement has been an important resource for developing and sustaining academic civic engagement at St. Olaf. Angélica Linder, outreach manager at the Northfield Public Library, also brings valuable community relationships and knowledge to this work. These contributions help connect academic inquiry with the people and places that make community-engaged scholarship meaningful.
St. Olaf’s Digital Scholarship Center (DiSCO) has also contributed to opportunities for faculty and students to explore public-facing research. Instructional Technologist for Geospatial and Data Services Sara Lynnore’s work with StoryMaps and other digital tools has helped us consider how research can be shared with wider audiences and how digital scholarship can support collaboration. This work highlights the importance of staff expertise and institutional support in making these projects possible.
Through my work with the Caribbean Studies Network, I have been developing opportunities to connect Caribbean studies with digital humanities through the Caribbean Studies Lab. The contributions of Ahmed Sajidan (Saji) Jarjis Rafsan ’27 have helped advance this collaborative work, and presenting at The Caribbean Digital XII in Boston provided an opportunity to share our research with a wider community of scholars. This work also illustrates how student contributions can help develop and extend larger scholarly initiatives.
The conference connected our project with scholars working at the intersection of Caribbean studies and digital humanities. For a student involved in developing a research initiative, such exchanges offer a chance to explain methodological choices, learn from other projects, and build relationships beyond St. Olaf.
These opportunities build on the work of St. Olaf’s Latin American Studies program and its connections to NCCLA and the wider field. Courses and faculty research introduce students to questions of Latinidad, migration, health, displacement, activism, and belonging. In my own teaching, I encourage students to connect their questions and experiences with scholarly inquiry while engaging critically with the histories, knowledge, and perspectives of others. Courses such as Mendoza-Mori’s Imagining Latinidad, Reyes Payán’s work on Latinx experiences and health care, and my teaching on displacement, activism, and belonging invite students to bring their experiences and questions into academic inquiry.
For me, community-engaged scholarship requires ongoing attention to how research is developed, conducted, and shared. I ask who helps shape the research questions, how people and communities are represented, and what they gain from participating. Institutional support can make this work possible, but meaningful reciprocity also depends on the relationships we build, the decisions we make, and our willingness to remain accountable to the communities with whom we work.
Pérez’s oral-history project and Rafsan’s digital scholarship make these connections visible. When St. Olaf invests in students and in the relationships that sustain their research, local knowledge can reach wider audiences while remaining accountable to the communities from which it grows. Our students are already contributing to those conversations.
My work as Boldt Chair has reinforced my belief that meaningful public scholarship depends on sustained relationships, institutional support, and a commitment to reciprocity. When students have opportunities to develop research with faculty, staff, and community partners, their work can contribute to wider scholarly conversations while remaining connected to the people and places from which it grows. For me, this is an important part of what the humanities can make possible.
