Puentes 2024 - 2025 View Other Sessions
Latine Research Week 2025
Puentes is excited about its upcoming Latine Research Week (LRW). Latine Research Week is an interdisciplinary, conference-style series of events that we host annually on campus to uplift research being conducted by Latine staff, faculty, and students, as well as research relevant to Latine populations. This year Latine Research Week will be held on February 24th - 27th in the Rackham Graduate School. In 2024, we were thrilled to host 19 research sessions, allocate space for over 90 presenters, and welcome over 850 attendees across our events. We hope to see an even greater turn out this year.
Puentes is pleased to announce our Latine Research Week (LRW) 2025 theme– Raíces y Presencia: Growing a Legacy Together. Raices, meaning roots in Spanish, evokes connections to our ancestral roots, cultural foundations, interconnectedness, and the symbolic planting of our roots here in Ann Arbor. Building off of our theme for LRW 2024, Illuminating Familismo, we wish to call attention to our ancestral roots and familial histories that have shaped who we are today: a diverse group of Latine graduate students making an impact in our respective fields. Puentes seeks to intentionally honor these cultural raíces and foundations in all of our programming, but especially during Latine Research Week.
During LRW, we redefine what an academic conference can and should look like. Across the last three LRWs, we have showcased the work of nearly 200 scholars from nearly 50 departments to over 1,000 attendees. It is evident that through this work, we are also establishing strong raíces for future generations of Latine scholars at the University of Michigan. As we plant our roots here to pursue our graduate education and as a collective, we are creating an integrative root system that serves to nourish one another throughout our academic tenure and beyond.
The word presencia, meaning presence in Spanish, calls attention to the commanding presence Puentes has had on campus since its founding in 2019. We have intentionally brought together a powerful network of trailblazing scholars, harkening back to our LRW 2023 theme, Floreciendo Juntos. Our presence at a predominantly White institution like the University of Michigan is especially salient during Latine Research Week as many of us have not had opportunities to see other Latine scholars and researchers conducting work for Latine populations. When we come together, we feel confident that we represent the generation of leaders and scholars who are positively transforming and diversifying the field. Through our interconnected raíces and everlasting presencia, the Puentes community is growing a legacy together here at the University of Michigan and continuing the legacies of our families and communities that have come before us.