Latinx Research Week is an interdisciplinary, conference-style series of events that we host annually on campus to uplift research being conducted by Latinx staff, faculty, and students, as well as research relevant to Latinx populations. This year Latinx Research Week will be held on March 11th - 14th in the Michigan Union.
The theme for Latinx Research Week 2024 is Illuminating Familismo. Familismo is a psychological construct as well as a protective Latinx cultural value that emphasizes the importance of family support, loyalty, and honor. Through our interdisciplinary program, we hope attendees will reflect on, interrogate, and reimagine how the academy can be transformed to acknowledge, welcome, and illuminate both our biological and chosen familial relationships. In past years, we have seen spouses, partners, siblings, parents, children, and members of the larger Latinx community attend Latinx Research Week in support of their presenting family members, thus reimagining what an academic conference could and should look like. Additionally, we have seen other families in attendance: families of co-workers, cohort-mates, best friends, and lab families to name a few. We recognize that many members of the Puentes familia may be far from home but have still chosen to plant roots here and create meaningful communities of chosen family members at UM. We hope that our curated program will illuminate the importance of familismo and encourage attendees to imagine how we can transform academic spaces into more inclusive spaces that honor our families, chosen or otherwise, and the ways they have supported our academic journeys. Latinx Research Week 2024: Illuminating Familiso highlights the many ways our families motivate, inspire, encourage, humanize, and uplift us as we conduct groundbreaking work in our respective fields.
For specific questions concerning Latinx Research Week, please write to puentes.admin@umich.edu.
