The University of New England’s Center for Global Humanities has announced speakers for the 2014-15 year in its sixth year of programming. The center is a public forum designed to introduce students and members of the public to the exploration of the great issues facing humanity today in partnership with the Maine Humanities Council, and also through an agreement with Euro-Arab Foundation Institute.
Cary Library will host the streamed lecture from 6-7 p.m. Monday, Oct. 27 by Peter H. Smith, who is a distinguished professor of political science and Simón Bolívar, professor of Latin American studies at the University of California, San Diego.
Is the United States losing influence over Latin America? Widely known as the “Colossus of the North,” the United States has long held a commanding position throughout the hemisphere—in economic, political, even cultural terms. Instruments of primacy have ranged from military intervention to political persuasion and, more positively, to the “soft power” associated with the popular appeal of American society (sports, film, music and the like.). Is this relationship now changing? Why and in what ways? Does it result from chronic U.S. inattention or from underlying structural factors? How might it affect the national interests of the United States — and of Latin American nations? What might the future hold?
