Home Department: Latin American Studies
Director of the Confluence Center
SLAT Area of Specialization: Sociocultural Dimensions of L2 Learning
Professor Javier Duran is a specialist in cultural and interdisciplinary studies along the U.S.-Mexico border. He is a native of the Arizona-Sonora desert region. Dr. Duran, a three-time UA alumnus, received his Ph.D. in Hispanic Literatures from Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Arizona, an M.A. in Latin American Studies, and a B.S. in Plant Sciences from the UA. Dr. Duran’s areas of teaching and research include U.S.-Mexican border studies, Latin American Cultural Studies, Mexican women’s literature and culture, and Chicana/Chicano-Latina/Latino narrative. He has received several research grants from state and federal agencies to conduct research and implement institutional programs during his career. He is the author of the book José Revueltas. Una poética de la disidencia, published by the Universidad Veracruzana in Mexico, five co-edited books on Cultural Studies, and numerous articles on literary and cultural themes. He has been editorial collaborator and reviewer for journals such as PMLA, Chasqui, Studies in Twentieth Century Literature, Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies, Studies in Latin American Popular Culture, South Eastern Latin Americanist, and La Palabra y el Hombre.
Dr. Duran has taught at Michigan State University, the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and he has been a Visiting Research Fellow at the Colegio de Sonora in Hermosillo, Mexico, as well as Visiting Teaching Fellow at the Universidad Veracruzana in Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico. He holds memberships in the Latin American Studies Association, Modern Language Association where he was one of the founding members of the MLA Discussion Group on Mexican Cultural and Literary Studies, and he is past President of the Association for Borderland Studies, the leading international organization on the study of border issues. Dr. Duran is currently working on projects dealing with border culture, human security, bio-politics, migrancy and checkpoints.
He has also investigated and taught about the connections between globalization, transnational identities and the Mexican and Latin American Diasporas. In addition to his administrative and scholarly endeavors, Dr. Duran is a faculty leader. He has participated in numerous college and university committees. Dr. Duran was selected to be in the inaugural class of the UA Academic Leadership Institute. He currently serves on the UA Press Advisory Board, the Faculty Senate, the Strategic Planning and Budget Advisory Committee, the Committee of Eleven (past chair), and also co-chaired the Presidential Diversity Task Force in 2016-2017. Most recently, Dr. Duran was elected to serve a four-year period on the International Board of the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI), and was appointed as co-chair of the UA Diversity Coordinating Council (DCC).